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ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, 



AND THE 



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OF THE 



OXFORD TRACTS, 



BY 



ISAAC TAYLOR, 

AUTHOR OF " SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM," &c. 



Fas est etenim, ut prisca ilia cselestk philosophise dogmata processu tem- 
poris, excurentur, limentur, poliantur; sed nefas est, ut commutentur; nefas, 
ut detruncentur, ut mutilentur. Accipiant licet evidentiam, lucem, distinc- 
tionemj sed retineant, necesse est, plenitudinem, integritatem, proprieta- 
tem. — ViNCENTius Lirinensis. 



PHILADELPHIA: 
HERMAN HOOKER, 

CHESTNUT STREET. 

1840. 









r-^^i>K^ 



Wm. S. Young, Printer. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

The circumstances of the argument, 21 

The substance of the argument, and the dependence of the 

modern church upon the ancient church, 40 

A test of the moral condition of the ancient church, 93 

The third and fourth propositions, and cpncluding remarks, 176 

INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 

The subject of the ancient celibacy not to be evaded. A 
principal element of ancient Christianity, and inseparable 
from the system, , 191 

CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE WITH THE NOTIONS 
ENTERTAINED OF THE DIVINE NATURE. 

The celibate the product of gnostic feeling. General prin- 
ciples of the oriental theosophy, in its earlier and later 
forms: opposition of the church to the series of gnostic 
heresies, while it imbibed the sentiment of them. The 
abstractive doctrine, and the penitential, both admitted 
by the ancient church. Indications of the gnostic theo- 
sophy in Athanasius, Gregory Nyssen, Gregory Nazian- 
zen, Basil, and Synesius,. 206 

CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE NOTIONS ENTER- 
TAINED OF THE SCHEME OF SALVATION. 

Combination of the Buddhist, or abstractive, and the Brah- 
minical, or penitential principles in popery — and in the 

B 



IV CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

ascetic institute of the Nicene church. The consequent 
exclusion of evanorelical doctrines and feelinors. Citation 
from Chrysostom — adulatory style of the fathers. In- 
stances from Boethius, Vincentius, Origen. Panegyric 
memoirs and epitaphic orations. Isidore; Life of St. An- 
tony by Athanasius, and eulogy of Athanasius by Nazi- 
anzen: eulogium of Cyprian by the same. Life of Cy- 
prian by his deacon Pontius. Ambrose, and his funeral 
oration on the death of his brother Satyrus. Ephrem's 
story of the monk Abraham and Mary. Chrysostom on 
the parable of the ten virgins, compared with Macarius, 2iS 

SOME SPECIAL METHODS OF ESTIMATING THE QUALITY OF 
THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 

The choice of texts. The epistolaiy style of the Nicene 
writers : their choice of subjects. The mythic exposition 
of scripture, and Origen's reason for resorting to it. Alle- 
gorical qualities of animals — Ambrose and the vulture. 
Chrysostom's expositions. True and false perspective 
in religion, and the admissions of the Oxford Tract wri- 
ters concerning the slender evidence of church princi- 
ples. Analysis of Chrysostom's nine homilies on repent- 
ance, 312 

Protestant Catholicity, 372 

THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, AS LAID DOWN IN THE 
NEW TESTAMENT. 

The analogous instance of the rule of martyrdom. Observa- 
tion on Luke xx. 35. Import of Matt. xix. 12, illustrated 
by our Lord's personal behaviour, and this compared with 
that of St. Martin of Tours. Import of 1 Cor. vii. Prac- 
tical comment of the Nicene monks upon the apostolic 
rule. Rev. xiv. 1 — 4 symbolical not literal, 377 

THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 

1 Tim. iv. plainly applicable to the ancient ascetic institute. 
Illustrations of the fulfilment of the prediction, 40() 



CONTENTS. V 

THE EXTENT OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 
IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH. 

PAGE 

Derivation of the anchoretic and monastic life: its general 
characteristics and localities. Testimonies in its favour. 
Methodius, Lactantius, council of Nice, and synods of 
Ancjra and Neocaesarea. The Apostolic Constitutions. 
Eusebius, Athanasius, Cyril, Hilary, Epiphanius, Basil, 
Gregory Naz., Ephrem, Gregory Nyss. Ambrose, Je- 
rome, Mark, Rufinus, Augustine, Chrysostom, and later 
writers, 423 

THE OPPOSITION MADE TO THE ANCIENT ASCETICISM. 

The extent of the opposition indifferent to the present ar- 
gument. Indications of dissent. Jovinian and Vigilan- 
tius overpowered by Jerome, Ambrose, and Augustine, 449 

MONKERY AND MIRACLE. 

The difference between Romish and Nicene legends — Al- 
ban Butler and Jerome ; life of St. Hilarion, 467 

MONKERY, THE RELIGION OF SOUTHERN EUROPE. 

Permanent characteristics of the south of Europe. The 
ancient asceticism as related to a disordered social condi- 
tion, 474 

MORAL Q,UALITY OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AS IT AFFECTED 
THE MONKS THEMSELVES. 

In its principal elements Basil's monastic life incompatible 
with genuine virtue, 480 

THE NECESSARY OPERATION OF AN ASCETIC INSTITUTE UPON 
THE MASS OF CHRISTIANS. 

Visible and arbitrary distinctions among Christians, fatal 
to piety and morals, 497 



vl CONTENTS. 



THE INClRECt INFLUENCE OF THE MONASTIC INSTITUTE UPON 
THE POSITION OF THE CLERGY. 

PAGE 

The ascetics constituted a class to be maintained, a class 
contributing to the funds of the church, and a class to be 
governed, 508 

THE DIRECT INFLUENCE OF THE CELIBATE UPON THE 
CLERGY. 

The progress of opinion, ending necessarily in the enforced 
celibacy of the clergy. The fathers and the inspired wri- 
ters at issue on this point, 519 

THE CONNEXION OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE WITH RITUAL 
NOTIONS AND PRACTICES. 

The Nicene sacramental doctrine the consequence of the 
condition of the clerical mind, and only another expres- 
sion of the ascetic principle. The taste for the marvel- 
lous, characteristic of the ascetic life, sought its gratifica- 
tion in this line. The rites of the church, means of go- 
vernment. The present feeling at Rome concerning 
Oxford Tract doctrines, 530 

Additional References and Citations, 547 



TO THE VERY REVEREND 



THOMAS BEWLEY MONSELL, 

ARCHDEACON OF DERRY, 
AND PRECENTOR OF CHRISt's CHURCH, DUBLIN. 



My Dear Sir : 

I am already assured of your approval, 
which has been so kindly and warmly ex- 
pressed, of my intention to take part in the 
discussions set on foot by the writers of the 
Tracts for the Times; but I am very desirous 
to bespeak, also, your acquiescence in the 
particular course of inquiry, w^hich, in this 
first instance, I have thought it best to insti- 
tute, and which may not be precisely what 
you would have anticipated. 

I have, in fact, taken as my motto on this 
occasion, the advice — Festina lente; and if 
I appear to have gone about, am yet per- 
suaded that I am following a path which 



via DEDICATION. 



promises to lead to a satisfactory, and not 
very remote conclusion. But I will state, as 
briefly as possible, the general views that 
have guided me in selecting the subjects, 
and in arranging the plan of my argument. 

Let me say, then, that the mode of repel- 
ling the pretensions of the Romish church, 
recommended by the writers of the Oxford 
Tracts, seems to me to be at once legitimate 
and conclusive : it is, in substance, an appeal 
from the alleged authority of that church, to 
a catholicity more catholic, and to an anti- 
quity more ancient. On this ground, British 
protestantism, or, let us say, if the phrase be 
preferred, British Christianity, stands on a 
rock, clear of all exception, and, so far as re- 
lated to popery, is exempt from all peril. 
Within the well-defined limits which it ob- 
serves, this line of argument is equally sim- 
ple and irrefragable. 

But having, in this manner, made good the 
external defences of the British episcopal 
church, when we come to look within the 
enclosure which we have thus walled about, 



DEDICATION. IX 

we are instantly met by some startling diffi- 
culties, of another kind, and are compelled 
to confess that, in thus throwing ourselves 
back upon Christian antiquity, embarrass- 
ments attend us from which there appears 
no easy way of escape. 

Men of calm minds, indeed, are painfully 
conscious of perplexity, while treading the 
fields of ancient Christian literature; and to 
this feeling is added some alarm when they 
witness the fatal infatuations which beset 
those who loiter there after surrendering 
themselves to the guidance of a fond anti- 
quarian enthusiasm; for such are often seen 
to yield their faith and reason to illusions that 
are not merely unsubstantial, but in the high- 
est degree dangerous. In truth, no notions 
that have ever prevailed among well-informed 
men, can have been more utterly destitute 
of firm support than are those which have 
been passionately adhered to in relation to 
the pristine church; nor have any been more 
fruitful sources of theological and practical 
errors. 

a2 



i)EDlCAT10N. 



The peculiar difficulties that attend the 
general subject of ecclesiastical antiquity, 
are not, however, obtruded upon the notice 
of the world, during quiescent periods; and, 
as the documents wherein this species of lore 
is imbedded are accessible to few, and fami- 
liar to still fewer, as well the instruction with 
which they are fraught, as the evils they 
may generate, often remain latent for a long 
course of years, and, therefore, may ordina- 
rily demand no vigilant regard. 

But it is otherwise at particular moments, 
when the dormant antiquarian zeal suddenly 
awakens, and claims a right of interference 
with every thing that is professed, believed, 
and done, in the open and active world. And 
if, at such a moment, this zeal, sharpened by 
the prejudices that are its usual characteris- 
tics, and animated, or even inflamed, by the 
illusions which it engenders, takes a bold 
course, and implicates the religious and civil 
institutions of the country, there are no limits 
hardly to the perils to w^hich every thing 
around us is immediately exposed. 



DEDICATION. XI 



This seems to me precisely what the writers 
of the Oxford Tracts are now, with the best 
intentions, and with the most devoted attach- 
ment to the episcopal church, actually doing; 
that is to say, they are fearlessly staking the 
credit, the influenc^e, and even the very ex- 
istence of the established church, upon the ' 
soundness of notions, regarding ancient Chris- 
tianity, which, as I am fully persuaded, will 
not endure an impartial examination; nay, 
which are miserably contradicted by abundant 
and unimpeachable evidence. 

There is surely reason enough then, for 
those who rank themselves with the friends of 
the established episcopal church, to take the 
alarm, and to follow closely the steps of these 
chivalrous divines. It is possible, indeed, and 
not unlikely, that the grounds of the doctrines 
advocated by these writers may insensibly 
be shifted; and that, finding their early as- 
sumptions to be utterly untenable, they may 
move off to a better chosen position. But 
even if it were so, the necessity would not be 
the less urgent for exploring that first chosen 
ground. In a word, the time is now mani- 



Xll DEDICATION, 



festly come when the Christian community^ 
at large, must be thoroughly and authenti- 
cally informed concerning the spiritual, and 
the moral condition of the church during that 
morning hour of its existence, which, too 
easily alas! has been surrounded with attri- 
'butes of celestial splendour, dignity, and pu- 
rity. 

To collect and diffuse this now indispen- 
sable information, is then the task I have 
undertaken; yet neither a very easy one, it 
must be granted, nor exempt from an invidi- 
ous aspect. To dissipate fond dreams may be 
a friendly and useful, but is never an ac- 
ceptable office. No one, I presume, will 
imagine that there remain to be adduced facts, 
or indications of facts, not alreadv well known 
to those who are conversant with the origi- 
nal documents of ecclesiastical antiquity. 
But it is nevertheless certain, and the course 
of the present controversy has strikingly 
shown it to be so, that, what is familiar to a 
few, may be altogether unsurmised by the 
mass, even of well-informed persons. Our 
modern church histories scarcely lift a cor- 



DEDICATION. XIU 



ner of the veil that hides froDi us the inner 
recesses of the ancient church. And the 
fathers may be looked into, here and there, 
without a suspicion being awakened of a 
state of thino^s which a more searching^ ex- 
amination brings to light. 

In commencing, then, these necessary re- 
searches, the immediate intention of which is 
not so much to controvert the particular prin- 
ciples or practices now under discussion, as to 
lay open the real condition, moral, spiritual, 
and ecclesiastical, of the ancient church, I have 
selected that one theme which, as I am fully 
persuaded, is better adapted than any other 
to answer the purpose of dissipating many 
illusions, and of generating a feeling of cau- 
tion in the minds of those who may just have 
given in, or may be on the point of giving in, 
their submission to the Oxford doctrines. 
Such, and I believe the number is now not 
small, I would here respectfully advise to sus- 
pend, a little, their judgment on the questions 
in hand, until they may have considered the 
evidence which I shall have to produce. 

As to yourself, my dear sir, you will not 



XIV DEDICATION. 



imagine that I am presuming to inform you 
of what you are not already acquainted with; 
and yet it is possible that the light in which 
I have placed some of these well-known facts, 
may seem to you new, and such as to deserve 
your regard. You will perceive that, while 
a single class of objects is before me, I have 
kept a donble purpose always in view, name- 
ly, in the first instance, to loosen a little that 
antiquarian enthusiasm which is putting every 
thing dear to us in peril; and, in the second 
place, to open a path whereon afresh assault 
may be made upon the errors of the papacy. 

You will see that, as a preliminary to the 
general argument, I have taken some pains 
to define and affirm, what some too much 
overlook — the dependence of tlie modern 
church upon the ancient church, lest, in les- 
sening a little the credit of the latter, I should 
seem to favour an ultra-protestant prejudice, 
the prevalence of v/hich has, in fact, afford- 
ed a handle to the Oxford Tract writers. 

And now, my dear sir, will you indulge 
me a moment while I make good my per- 
sonal plea to be listened to in the present con- 



DEDICATION. XV 

troversy ? — It will be granted then, that, what- 
ever course this wide discussion may take, it 
has, in all its branches, so intimate a con- 
nexion with ecclesiastical antiquity, as that 
it must, for the most part, be left in the hands 
of those who have happened to acquire some 
familiarity with this branch of learning, and 
who, moreover, possess the indispensable ad- 
vantage of actually having, under their hands, 
the body of ancient ecclesiastical literature. 
But these conditions confine, within rather 
narrow limits, the choice which the reliofious 
public might make (among those, already 
known to it as writers) of any to stand for- 
ward as qualified to deal with the general 
subject. Then again, among such, few as 
they may be, some have already ranged them- 
selves on the side of the Oxford writers; and 
some, perhaps, would admit themselves to be 
altogether disinclined to the task of dealing 
severely, with their favourite authors. 

On these grounds, then, as actually possess- 
ing the Greek and Latin church waiters, and 
as being, in some degree, used to their com- 



XVI ^ DEDICATION. 

pany, and moreover, as exempt, in the most 
complete manner, from the antiquarian en- 
thusiasm, I have felt as if I might, v^ithout 
culpable presumption, take a part in the great 
controversy of the day. 

And farther, as this controversy affects, in 
a peculiar manner, the welfare of the esta- 
blished episcopal church, it seems as if it 
should be demanded of those who engage in 
it, that they can profess a firm conviction in 
favour of the principle of religious establish- 
ments, and of episcopacy; as well as a cor- 
dial approval of liturgical worship, and spe- 
cifically, of that of the established church. 
On this ground, then, my deliberate opinions 
are such as to allow of my fairly entering 
the lists. 

There is, however, yet a ground on which 
I feel that a rather peculiar advantage, in re- 
lation to such a controversy, belongs to me ; 
and it is the circumstance of my personal in- 
dependence of the established church, and of 
my absolute exemption from the influence of 
any indirect motive for thinking, or for giro- 



DEDICATION. XVU 



fessing, thus or thus, in any question affect- 
ing its credit and welfare. As a layman, I 
have no secular interests at stake in ecclesi- 
astical questions. I have nothing but truth 
to care for. And, moreover, my actual con- 
nexion, by education, and otherwise, with 
dissenters, may be accepted as giving to my 
decisive opinion in favour of the established 
church, the value, whether more or less, that 
may attach to principles that have resulted 
altogether from serious reflection. And I will 
here take leave to remind you, that, in de- 
claring myself some years ago on this side, 
I did so with a freedom of remark, in regard 
to the church, which precluded my winning 
any favour from its stanch adherents, or 
public champions. In fact, and I hope you 
will allow me on this occasion to make the 
profession, my convictions, on this subject, 
have been so powerful and so serious, as to 
lead me to put out of view every personal 
and secondary consideration. 

None will imagine, my dear sir, that, in 
addressing these pages to you, I have, in any 
way, compromised your personal or profes- 



XVlll DEDICATION. 



sional character, or involved you in any sort 
of responsibility, in regard to what they may 
contain. All the burden rests on my own 
shoulders. You are clear; and while I am 
much gratified in being able to refer to the 
expressions with which, from time to time, 
you have honoured me, of your Christian re- 
gard and friendship, I am anxious to pre- 
clude the supposition that you have done 
more than generally approve of my purpose 
to engage in the present discussion, and to 
express your confidence in the soundness of 
my principles and the rectitude of my inten- 
tions. 

It now only remains for me to disclaim 
every hostile or acrimonious feeling towards 
the accomplished, and, I have no doubt, tho- 
roughly sincere writers of the Tracts for the 
Times. If compelled to range myself among 
their opponents, I owe them no grudge; and 
am very ready to admit the importance of 
the services they.have rendered to the church, 
in reviving some hitherto slighted principles; 
and particularly, in bearing a testimony, with 
great ability, against modern rationalism. I 



DEDICATION* XllL 

admire, moreover, and would fain imitate, the 
mild and Christian temper in which, for the 
most part, they write; and should deeply re- 
gret the inadvertence, should it appear that, 
in any instance, I have allowed an expression 
to escape me, that might seem to carry an 
unpleasant and personal meaning, or to be 
more pungent than the serious import of the 
argument would have demanded. 

It is true that I have a deep impression of 
the mischiefs and dangers attending, or likely 
to arise from, the dilFusion of the principles 
which these divines are so zealously, and, as 
it appears, so successfully advocating; and 
this conviction must be held to justify the 
most determined style of opposition. In this, 
however, there is no breach of Christian 
charity. The writers must be accounted sin- 
cere and devout, although it should appear 
that they will have involved the church and 
the country in the most serious dangers. The 
spread of these doctrines is, in fact, now hav- 
inor the effect of renderins: all other distinc- 
tions obsolete, and of severing the religious 
community into two portions, fundamentally 



XX DEDICATION. 

and vehemently opposed one to the other. 
Soon there will be no middle ground left; 
and every man, and especially every clergy- 
man, will be compelled to make his choice 
between the two. What practical decision 
can be more momentous, or demand more 
deliberation and impartial research ? 

I indulge the hope, then, my dear sir, that 
I shall be able to afford some aid to those, 
especially among the younger clergy, w^ho 
may actually be halting between the two 
opinions; and I well know that, while giving 
myself to my laborious task, I shall have the 
benefit of your cordial good wishes and pray- 
ers that that aid and blessing may be afforded 
me, apart from which, no endeavours can be 
fruitful of good. 

It is, my dear sir, with every sentiment of 
respect and esteem, that I subscribe myself 
yours, 

THE AUTHOR. 



Stanford Rivers, 
Feb, 20, 1839. 



m 



ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, 

&C. &C. 

The great questions agitated but not determined tliree 
hundred years ago, are now coming on to be discussed, 
and under circumstances as auspicious altogether as they 
were lately unexpected. The reproach of the reforma- 
tion, that it did not fully ascertain its own principles, as 
well as the opprobrium of the church in later times, that 
little or nothing has been amended since Luiher, Cran- 
mer, and Knox went to their rest, are now, at last, very 
likely to be removed. 

While many are looking with terror at the unchecked 
spread of Romanism around the English church, aiid 
with alarm at the prevalence of opinions within its most 
sacred precincts which apparently contravene the labours 
of the reformers, there is, as I think, room to admit a 
very difTerent feeling in relation to these signs of the 
times, I mean a feeling of exhilaration and hope as to 
the probable, and almost inevitable result, as well of the 
busy zeal of the Romish clergy as of the conscientious 
labours of the authors and favourers of the '^ Tracts for 
the Times.'' I mu^t profess to regard the former, and 
still more decidedly the latter of these feature oT nur 
religious coiidition, when luukud at in their remoter,' 
though not distant tendencies, as indicative of good, and 
tuch as should awaken to a new activity all who are pi- 

e 



22 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC 

onsly wailing for the renovation of the influence of 
Christianity. 

And yet, in making this cheering profession, it ought 
to be acknowledged, lest we should seem to be conceal- 
ing what it is neither candid nor saie to deny, that theye 
are consequences not very unlikely to be attached to the 
Oxford Tract controversy which, in their bearing upon 
the peculiar position of the established church at the 
present moment, may well excite anxiety in the minds 
of its devoted friends, and, indeed, in tfie minds of all 
who acknowledge that an intimate connexion subsists 
between the welfare of the estal)lished church and the 
very existence of our most cherished civrl institutions.^ 
It is not surely to pretend to any extraordinary sagacity 
to affirm that some of the questions moved by the writers^ 
we refer to, affect, not very circuitously, the constitu- 
tional influence o( the aristocracy, and even the stability 
of the throne. 

In truth, great revolutions, as has been said of some 
other formidable abstractions, are wont to advance upon 
us in noiseless slippers, and taking their rise from some 
quarter which was the last to be watched or suspected, 
amaze the heedless community with their terrible sud- 
denness, as much as with their destructive force. This, 
at least, must be admitted by all, that the general scheme 
of principles and sentiments that lias been imbodied in 
the publications referred to, recommends itself by a still 
depth, a latent power, a momentum, and a consistency 
in its development, which are the very cliaracieristics of 
those movements that are to go on, and are to bring with 
them great changes, whether for the belter or the worse. 
Really to despise this system is, I think, very inconsi- 
derate, and to afi'ect to despise it, very dangerous. 



CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ARGUMENT. 23 

The political condition of the country being such as 
it is, (if, in fact, we may any longer distinguish between 
the political and the religious,) and teeming as it does 
with elements of disorder, there are many, no doubt, 
who would most gladly remand, to some more conve- 
nient season, the agitation of ecclesiastical doctrines 
which touch the solid structure of the constitution. This 
desire of tranquillity may be reasonable enough in itself; 
but it is unavailing, or it comes now too late. Very many 
minds, and these, not of the despicable populace, or of 
the poorly informed middle classes, but of the best 
taught and the best trained, and of those whose personal 
interests are the most weighty, have already been deeply 
moved, and are as unwilling to be left to subside into 
their former state of indolent acquiescence as those who 
have so wrought upon ihem are disinclined to remit 
their labours. What event, in fact, can be more impro- 
bable than that men whose success in producing this 
deep commotion has vastly surpassed their own fondest 
expectations, should spontaneously relax their exertions, 
or should begin to despond mid way in a broad trium- 
phant course? Nothing remains, then, whatever perils 
may impend, but for those who range themselves on an 
opposite side, to encounter their formidable, accom- 
plished, and flushed antagonists in the best manner they 
are able. 

Yet, even if it were now at the option of any who 
might wish to do so, to hush, at this particular moment, 
the controversy which is gathering around us — or even 
if it might be thought probable that, left to itself, this 
dreaded system would share the fate of many a porten- 
tous wonder that has quickly sunk into oblivion — even 
in such a case, a true prudence might impel us rather to 



24 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC. 

prciiiole than to check the rising agitation, and to desire 
rhat, once set fairly in movement, as it now is, the ques- 
tion of those groat and first principles, apart from the 
prcH ist' adjns'ment of which our Eiigli^^h protestantism 
lias remained weak and vulnerable on every side, should 
be brought to its close without delay: and better now, 
than in some darker liour, when political commotions of 
a still more portentous kind than those which at present 
disturb the country, would greatly enhance the perils in- 
separable from such a controversy, while they must, in 
an equal degree, diminish the probability of bringing it 
to a happy issue. 

The cry of " Popery!" raised by certain of the oppo- 
nents of the Oxford doctrines, must be granted to do as 
little credit to the discrimination of those who raise it, 
as to their candour. Nevertheless, and although the ill- 
judged attempt to confound these doctrines with Roman- 
ism, or to disparage tliem, unheard, by an implication 
in the same obloquy, and thus to use an unfair advan- 
tage, drawn from popular prejudices, is to be strongly 
condemned and carefully avoided, it is yet certain that, 
in argumentative order, these principles and opinions 
must take the lead, as standing first to be considered, 
when we have the Romish errors in view; and that the 
question of Romanism must follow in the track of the 
present controversy, without an interval. 

In truth, modern popery will never be dealt with to 
any good purpose, on the ground of argument, until the 
preliminary discussion which is induced by the Tracts 
for the Times, has been disposed of to the satisfaction, 
not perlinps of the immediate disputants, but of all honest, 
reasonable, and intelligent by-standers. 

1 .have used the words controversy, argument, and 



CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ARGUMENT. 25 

discussion, correlatives as they are, and innplying two 
or more parties, visibly in conflict; and yet, in the pre- 
sent instance, while, on the one side, the champions 
stand forward as a compact band, it is not very easy to 
name their actual opponents. To confess a humiliating 
truth, the writers of the Tracts for the Times are coolly 
looking over the field, and asking for those with whom 
they may engage. I am not uninformed of, nor do I 
wish to disparage, several able writers who have lately 
come forward in this controversy; but, as I shall show, 
there are special reasons why their opposition should 
be reckoned at less than, intrinsically, it may be worth. 

It appears that a peculiar disadvantage attaches to each 
of the accredited religious parties among us, to whom it 
is natural to look, as the opponents of the Oxford divines. 
These incidental difficulties constitute, in fact, the most 
serious, or, it might be said, ominous circumstance of 
the present theological crisis. What I mean precisely 
is this- — ^that, whatever w^e may privately surmise con- 
cerning the unsoundness of the principles assumed in 
this system, yet that those who maintain it, accomplished 
and well skilled in argument as they are, when they 
come to confront any one of our religious parties, mani- 
festly possess, from incidental causes, the vantage ground, 
as related to that single class of antagonists; and so of 
each in its turn. 

It is only by the sheer necessity of the case, and at 
the impulse of motives arising from a very unusual oc- 
casion, that I could be induced to euter upon so delicate 
and invidious a subject as the weak points — the wound 
in the hand, which disables one party and another in 
their assaults upon the Oxford Tract writers. Let, how- 
ever, indulgence be given to a calm statement of the 

3* 



26 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC. 

simple facts, and in terms as free as possible from what 
might justly oflend any. To name first those who actu- 
ally stniKl foremost, and the description belongs to a 
huge, and every way considerable body in the esta- 
blished church, who, professing the most cordial and 
unexceptive approbation of the church, as it is, in its 
constitution, its ritual, and its position as related to the 
state, and who are accustomed to admire the fathers of 
the English Reformation on no account more than on 
that of their wisdom in carrying amendment just to the 
point where it actually stopped, and no farther, and who 
deprecate any sort of movement or agitation that tends 
to change these stanch and well-contented Church-of- 
England men, w^hen they come to deal, in detail, with 
the Oxford opinions, may, without much difficulty, be 
compelled to confess, first, that the church, as settled by 
Edward VI. and Elizabeth, embraces, or favours princi- 
ples not as yet fully carried out, either in its offices or 
in its discipline and working; and secondly, that the 
cliurch, or the country, or both, has been slowly and 
imperceptibly moving forward (some will say down- 
ward) from the ground whereon it was reared by its 
founders, and that, to employ the favourite phrase of 
the Oxford Tracts, we, of the present day, have become 
" far more protestant," than were the English protestants 
of the sixteenth century. Upon men of ihis parly, there- 
fore, the Oxford writers urge notliing but mere consist- 
ency: they wish for notliing that is not involved in the 
professions of the sound adherents of our proiestant 
episcopacy: what ihcy plead for is not a reform, but a 
return. 

Nor can this appeal be otherwise resisted than by q 
{lardy determination to hear nothing which might trou- 



CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ARGUMENT. 27 

ble the present peace of the church. la fact, as it seems, 
numbers belonging to the party now referred to, if it 
should be called a party, have given in their submission 
to the Oxford leaders, and wait only the aid of a little 
more concurrence on the part of others, to promote 
openly what they favour silently. 

Consisting often of the very same individuals, and 
yet needing to be distinguished in regard to our present 
object, is the body which stands foremost in upholding, 
and approving of, the political constitution of the 
church, and which is more concerned (or seemingly so) 
for the establishment than it is for the church, and is 
zealous for episcopacy, on behalf of prelacy, and is 
prepared (unless we do them an injustice in so pre- 
suming to divine their dispositions) to admit certain 
changes which might even compromise a lillle the higher 
and more spiritual principles of the church, were it 
manifest that such alterations would tend to strengthen 
the stakes, and to lengthen the cords of the hierarchical 
tabernacle. 

Between men of this temper and the writers of the 
Tracts for the Times, there is a fundamental, and, it 
must be added, an ominous discordance, as well of feel- 
ing as of first principles. This discrepancy, although 
for the present it may be cloaked and hushed by the 
discreet, cannot but become more and more notorious; 
nor is it easy to see by what practical expedients the 
serious political consequences it involves are to be 
evaded. This capital difference, although men may not 
be willing to allow it, is nothing less than a rift in the 
foundations of the ecclesiastical structure: it is a settle' 
ment more narrowly to be looked to than might be th@ 



28 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC. 

broken windows and shattered ornaments that should 
mark some rude assault of the mob from without. 

It is not merely that the authors and promoters of the 
Oxford divinity are, generally speaking, men of a far 
more serious temper, and possessed of better digested 
notions, and are of more religious habits, than their op- 
ponents (of the class now referred to,) and are incom- 
parably better prepared to sustain any consequences 
which their consistency may entail upon them, and are 
therefore stronger, by a settled courage and a calm fore- 
thought of trouble; but they have possessed themselves 
of lofty principles, in comparison of which the compro- 
mising, secular, and heartless maxims of political church- 
men will prove, in tlie collision, as stubble or as sand. 

These — that is to say, the political adherents and 
champions of the establishment who admire, not so 
much the tenderness of our English reformers toward 
popery, as their obsequious discretion in regard to the 
Tudors, and who, as children of this world, and fond of 
tinsel, have always looked upon the trammels of church 
subserviency as trappings of honour — these persons now 
find themselves suddenly placed in a new and unexpected 
position of embarrassment; or rather their actual posi- 
tion has been laid bare, with little ceremony, on the 
very side where they might most wish to avoid expo- 
sure. And by whom has this exposure been attempted? 
Not by sour puritans, or reckless levellers ; not by the 
vulgar and the fanatical; not by the professed enemies 
of the church, of whatever class, and with any of whom 
it miglit have been easy to deal, in the wonted modes of 
haughty vituperation, or who need not have been listened 
to at all, so long as they could have been outvoted*. 



CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ARGUMENT. 29 

Such are not, at present, the troublers of the peace of 
the hierarchy; but they are men whose ripe accomplish- 
ments as divines, and whose unquestioned attachment 
to the episcopal church, not merely exempt them from 
contempt or suspicion, but secure for them, and for 
whatever they may write, the respectful attention of all 
portions of the clergy, and of all among the laity whose 
opinions can, in such a case, have weight. Or if any 
thing were yet wanting to secure an advantage which 
the one side might desire, and which the other might 
fear to see possessed by their opponents, these new 
champions of church supremacy actually enjoy it, name-; 
ly, official influence, and the means of moulding the 
temper of the younger clergy to their will. 

As opposed to men thus advantageously placed, and 
thus furnished — men girding themselves to act the part 
of confessors, if not of martyrs, political churchmen, 
whether whigs or tories, cannot but feel their weakness, 
Fatal concessions were made, and dangerous compro- 
mises submitted to by the fathers of the English church, 
under the despotism of the Tudors, and these very er- 
rors (unavoidable, perhaps) are now become the unto- 
ward inheritance of the champions of the protestant estab- 
lishment. These, therefore, can wish for nothing so 
much as silence and repose :^ — in serious controversy, 
whenever it may come on, nothing awaits them but over- 
throw ; and it is a circumstance which none ought to lose 
sight of, that, how little soever the declared enemies of 
the established church may themselves personally relish 
the doctrines of the Oxford Tracts, their instinctive sym- 
pathies would at once coalesce with these writers, if seen 
to be contending, for high and religious principles, wuth 
the secular minded and political champions of the est^b-r 



30 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC. 

iishment. Obvious motives too, would operate, as well 
with Romanists, as with dissenters, and with the atheistic 
party impelling them, one and all, to cheer and aid these 
Jbold and learned impugncrs of church-and-state subser- 
viency. 

But we must look to another quarter in quest of those 
who might come forward, unencumbered, to withstand 
the advances of the Oxford doctrines; and may it be to 
that, in every sense, estimable portion of the clergy — 
call them not a party, which has conventionally been de- 
signated — evangelical? It is true that the modern disci- 
ples and successors of Romaine, Fletcher, Milner, Cecil, 
Scott, and Newton, have by the sheer force of the cur- 
rent of church affairs, been carried toward a new position, 
and have been led greatly to modify and to tighten the 
-ecclesiastical notions professed by their departed leaders. 
They nevertheless still hold to opinions, and to modes 
.of feeling, which, though, as a matter of fact, springing 
.up within the established church, are not of it, are not 
its genuine products, or strictly indigenous to its soil; 
for they were the products of the new religious anima- 
tion diffused through the country by the apostolic labours 
of Wesley, Whitefield, and their followers ; nor can it 
well be denied that those who have professed these opi- 
nions, and who have felt in this manner, have stood <^s 
churchmen, in what is called — a false position; at least 
a position of difficulty, and of some practical embarrass- 
ment. 

If this be the case, or just so far as it may be granted 
to be so, nothing can be less desirable to the evangelical 
clergy than to be forced into any formal or particular ar- 
gument with their accomplished and learned brethren, 
pn the very points that have driven some of their most 



CIRCUiyiSf ANCES OF THE ARCTUIHENT. 31 

tJi^tingnished predecessors, and of themselves, to the 
edge of nonconformity, and which chafe many a sensi- 
tive conscience. They may, by the aid of peculiaf con- 
siderations, drawn from the perils of the time, have 
brought themselves to believe that they seriously di'saf- 
fect nothing in the ritual or constitution of the church; 
and they may be satisfied with this or that elaborate ex- 
planation of certain difficulties ; nevertheless the uneasi- 
ness, although assuaged, is not removed, for the difficul- 
ty is real, and its reality, and its magnitude, must be 
brought afresh before them, to the renewal of many pain- 
ful conflicts of mind, whenever the genuine and original 
tjhurch of England principle and discipline, comes, as 
now, by the Oxford divines, to be insisted upon, ex- 
pounded, and carried out to its fair consequences. 

What the English reformers had in view, was — An- 
cient Christianity, or the doctrine, and discipline, and 
i-itual of the Nicene age, and of the times nearly preceding 
that age ; and so far as the altered condition of the social 
system, and so far as the secular despotism allowed them 
to follow their convictions, they realized their idea, and 
probably would have done so to the extent of a close imi- 
tation, had it been possible, of all but the more offen- 
sive features of that early system. But how utterly dif- 
ferent a notion of Chfistianity was that vvhich animated 
the zeal of the founders of methodism, and which, in the 
main, was caught by the fathers of the evangelical clergy. 
Holding to the same orthodoxy — the same Nicene and 
Athanasian doctrine, every thing else in the two systems 
stands out as a point of distinction. What parallels 
could be more incongruous, even to absurdity, than such 
as one might strive to institute, for instance, between 
Cyprian and Romaine, Tertuliian and Milner, Chrysos-* 



32 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETCJ. 

torn and Cecil, Augustine and Scott, Jerom and New- 
ton ! 

The evangelical clergy, as Christian ministers, and as 
theologians, when they stand on open ground, may in- 
deed freely and with advantage contend against what 
they may deem superstitious or papistical in the system 
of the Oxford writers : but can they do so, precisely as 
churchmen ? It does not appear how, on this narrower 
field, they are to make good their footing. 

Or, leaving doctrine and ritual out of the question, and 
looking solely to the ominous topic of church supremacy 
or subserviency in relation to the state, the evangelical 
clergy cannot but feel the discussion to be inconvenient 
and undesirable ; for it is they, more than any others, that 
must be painfully conscious of what have been the ill 
practical influences of the usurpations, and the lay in- 
terference that were submitted to, as by dire necessity, 
on the part of the founders of the establishment. So it 
happens that, in resisting what they regard as the super- 
stitions of the Oxford divines, if driven back, they are 
driven upon puritanism ; while in withstanding the Ox- 
ford church- supremacy doctrine, their retreat, if defeated, 
can only be toward, either the dead levels of political 
expediency, or the swamps of dissent. It is with every 
sentiment of respect and affection toward this portion of 
the clergy, that I state the fact of their difncult position 
in regard to the present controversy; and I do so for the' 
sake of precluding the fallacious hope that the now 
spreading opinions are to be withstood, much less over-^ 
thrown, by those who occupy this particular ground. 

It is perhaps unnecessary to insist upon the unfitness 
of any class of dissenters to engage in controversy with 
the writers of the Tracts for the TimeSj inasmuch aff 



CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ARGUMENT. 3^ 

there seems little probability that such an attempt will 
be made. Dissenters have had their advantage, and they 
have reaped their glory, in contending for our religious 
liberties, and moreover they have found points of easy 
attack in assailing the loose opinions of political church- 
men; they may also have won partial triumphs, in urging 
the argument of consistency against the evangelical 
clergy; but they would find themselves, as I am inclined 
to think, stripped of most of these incidental advantages, 
and to be dealing altogether with another sort of adver* 
sary, were they to close in with the Oxford divines upon 
the questions now agitated. The time undoubtedly must 
come, and the increasing learning and intelligence (and 
candour too, it is hoped) of the dissenting bodies, tend 
to hasten its approach, when the crude assumptions on 
which the modern congregational system rests, will be 
sifted anew, and when the principle of unchecked de- 
mocracy, in church government, will be brought to the 
test of scripture. But a controversy with the writers of 
the Oxford Tracts could not fail to bring on such a scru- 
tiny under circumstances which would render a defeat, 
even on single points, peculiarly mortifying. These as- 
tute and accomplished men — the Oxford writers, clearly 
rid, as they are, of the many embarrassments that have 
encumbered the less consistent churchmen, with whom, 
heretofore, dissenters have had to do, would, in rebutting 
the arguments of congregationalists, find themselves free 
to take up aggressive weapons, and might bring the ec- 
clesiastical axioms of dissent into question, in a manner 
not to be desired by its adherents. It may then be con- 
sidered as a point of discretion with the dissenting bodies 
to provoke no controversy in the present instance, and 
especially as they have no immediate concern in thi^ 

4 



34 AJJCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC. 

great argil merit, and in fact arti more likely to gett credit 
by standing off from the fray, than to reap advantage 
from taking a part in it. 

Moreover, it is clear that the various, but intimately 
connected subjects, theological and ecclesiastical, at this 
time likely to be discussed, all come under the common 
condition of involving laborious researches upon the field 
of Christian antiquity. But this is a field not much fre- 
quented, in our own times, by non-conformists of any 
class. It is but a few individuals, of these communions, 
that profess any direct acquaintance with the Greek and 
Latin divines ; nor do the tastes of the dissenting bodies 
at all favour any reference of the sort. 

But granting, as we may, that, when we have to con- 
sider the safety and instruction ot the uninformed reli- 
gious classes, in relation to any prevailing errors, the 
only practicable method is that of a simple adherence 
to the biblical branch of the argument ; it is yet perfectly 
clear that, when we are turning to those who are them- 
selves to be the sources of instruction, and the guides of 
the ignorant, theological discussions must include a much 
wider range of inquiry : and as to questions, such as 
those with which, in the present instance, we have to 
do, there can be but one course likely to lead to a final 
adjustment of the points in dispute; and this only course 
must embrace a patient and piercing examination of the 
entire body of ancient Christian literature, so far as novV 
extant. Any method more summary, specious as it may 
seem, will, as I venture to predict, produce only a mo- 
mentary impression, and will leave us liable to a speedy 
return of the very same controversies. But if the great 
argument be courageously encountered at the first, and 
entered upon with an immoveable determination to spare 



CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ARGUMENT. 35 

no toil, to evade no difficulty, and to carry the torch of 
modern intelligence, and modern biblical feeling, into 
every, and the most intricate recesses of ancient Chris- 
tianity, there is a reasonable hope that, under the divine 
blessing, a real and permanent progress may be made in 
the momentous work of freeing our holy religion, effec- 
tually and finally, from the corruptions of many centuries. 

There are some, however, who are telling us, and it 
must be granted, not without an appearance of reason, 
that our notions of the importance of the present con- 
troversy are vastly exaggerated, and that therefore no 
such laborious courses of argument as those I am now 
indicating, can be necessary ; and on the contrary it is 
affirmed that, left to itself, this new portent, like many 
equally alarming, will quickly disappear from our skies. 
It is indignantly asked — if we are to be disquieted in this 
degree, and to be moved from our places, at the bidding 
of a band of recluses, who, accomplished as they may be 
in worthless lore, and respectable and estimable perhaps, 
as Christians, or as clergymen, have yet shown them- 
selves so feeble in understanding as to bow to the frivo- 
lous superstitions of the darkest times. Are we, it is 
asked, to be led by those who suffer themselves to be 
led by the grim spectres of the twilight age of the 
church's history, and the midnight age of the world's 
history ? 

It must be confessed that, on this ground, a rea^sonable 
doubt may be entertained concerning the triumph of the 
particular Oxford confederacy, and of the magnitude of 
the issue in which the present movement is to terminate. 
A silent acquiescence in trivial superstitions, or even a 
forward zeal in maintaining frivolous formalities, affords 
no criterion of mental strength, in an age universally 



36 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC, 

superstitious, and grossly ignorant ; but it is hard not to 
consider such compliances, or such solemn trifling, as 
genuine indications of an infirm temperament, when they 
meet us in times of diflfused intelligence, and of vigor- 
ous mental activity. It is not to be doubted that many 
a spirit of power, in times gone by, has bowed and 
cringed, and moulded itself to the pattern of a Cassian's 
Institute ; but can any spirit of power now act the same 
part ? Shall we now any where find strong and sound 
minds forcing themselves to lisp mummeries, to prate, 
and whisper, and juggle, and drivel, and play the church 
puppet, after the fashion of -the monkery of the tenth 
century? Few will believe this to be possible: — it is 
indeed hard for any to believe it. In an age, not of 
idle but of solid learning, an age of genuine, not of 
vain philosophy; in an age (be it of too much license 
and of irreligious latitude, yet) of real force and manli- 
ness, and of rational and steady zeal ; in an age when, 
beside the noisy pretenders to high qualities, there are, 
on every side, and in the private walks of life, the pos- 
sessors of high qualities of mind and sentiment; if in 
such an age, men who have wanted no advantages of 
culture, are seen, in their imitations of antiquity, not 
merely to be bringing before us what might justly be 
venerated on the score of pristine purity, but also what, 
unless it could boast the hoary recommendations of time, 
must be ridiculed as simply absurd, in such a case, more 
than a surmise suggests itself, as to the intellectual sta- 
ture of the diligent and zealous antiquaries who maybe 
playing the part here supposed. 

But whatever estimate may be formed of individuals 
(and it is unnecessary in this instance, as well as invidi^ 
Qus to form any) the opinions in question are to be con^ 



CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ARGUMENT. 37 

sidered in their intrinsic weight and permanent validity^ 
and also in their bearing, which is peculiar, upon the re- 
lative position of the established church, and of Roman- 
ism. In this view no controversy that has been started 
in modern times, ought to be thought more important, 
and if, at the present moment it have fallen into feeble 
hands, (a fact I do not affirm) more sturdy arms, we need 
not doubt, will ere long snatch the weapons now un- 
sheathed, and will command the respect of their opponents. 
The opinions advanced in the Tracts for the Times, 
may die away, for awhile ; but they must revive at 
some time not very remote. Motives of discretion, and 
the fear of change, natural to men in office, may lead to 
a gradual and silent retreat from the ground that was 
taken when the probable consequences of maintaining so 
advanced a position had not been maturely considered. 
The CENTRE PRINCIPLE of the Tracts for the Times — 
the unalienable right of the church to an uncontrolled 
internal government, and its inherent spiritual supremacy 
in relation to the civil power, generally, and to the tem- 
porary administration of that power in particular, this 
weighty doctrine tends directly, as all must see, to a 
disruption of the existing connexion between the church 
and the state, or to a schism, a rending of the texture 
from the top to the bottom ; the state being now under 
the guardianship of parties utterly adverse to any such 
elevated notions, and not at all likely to surrender so 
considerable a means of sustaining, from session to ses- 
sion, its tottering existence, as is afforded by the pos- 
session of an undue and irreligious influence over the 
church. Obvious motives of discretion may therefore, 
for awhile, restrain the combatants on the one side of 
this controversy as well as on the other ; and if even 

4* 



38 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC. 

the promoters of it have braced their minds to meet all 
the consequences of the opinions which, with tliem, are 
serious matters of religion and conscience, it may not 
be so with the clergy at large, without whose willing 
ear and concurrence it would not be possible, even for 
the most accomplished writers, long to bear up against 
that tide of public opinion which they have to stem. 
With the clergy at large it must rest to decide whether, 
by favouring an agitation that touches the principle ol 
the protestant establishment, they shall bring every thin^ 
dear to them into peril — the establishment itself first — 
then the due influence of the aristocracy, and then the 
denuded throne ; or whether, by promptly withdraw- 
ing all support from these agitators, and by turning 
away their ear, they shall stave off, awhile, the most 
dire commotion, religious and political, that has ever 
convulsed this country. 

The prediction has often been uttered, and by men of 
different parties and opposite feelings, that if England 
is again to undergo revolutionary struggles, the heaving 
will commence within the church. If then any such 
course of events be at all probable, the earliest symp- 
toms of its approach should be observed, and the oppor- 
tunity seized (if it be offered) of so opening the ground, 
as to give free and timely vent to the volcanic fire that 
murmurs beneath our feet. 

It is therefore on this account especially that, while 
yet we may do so in tranquillity, a prompt and thorough 
attention should be paid to such at least of the Oxford 
opinions, as may be the most readily disposed of; and 
so, one by one, to extract the perilous ingredients from 
the mass. And whatever circumstance, of an extrinsic 
Uind, recommends these opinions as they are now ad-* 



CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ARGUMENT. 39 

vanced, furnishes a corroboratory reason for dealing with 
them so as that if dispelled, it shall be for ever. 

These extrinsic recommendations are in fact nearly 
as great as can be imagined; and they are as extraordi- 
nary as unlocked for. The solemn and plaintive tones 
of the ancient church, once heard amid tjie pangs of 
martyrdom, or resounding as soft echoes wakening the 
solitudes of the deserts of Syria, Arabia, and upper 
Egypt, the very same tones, and the same testimony, 
at once for great truths and for great errors too — for 
eternal verities, and for futile superstitions, are now, and 
after so long a silence, breaking from the cloisters of 
Oxford. 

This revival of the religion, and of the forms, of the 
principle, and of the costume of the martyr church, has 
not sprung np in Germany, where the love of mysticism 
and paradox, recommended by rich erudition, is every 
day evolving systems destined to enjoy their turn of 
celebrity, and to be forgotten ; but in England, where a 
characteristic national good sense, and a vigorous prac- 
tical feeling, and the free interaction of all elements, 
moral and intellectual, combine to give condensation, 
and so much the more force, to whatever courts the suf- 
frages of the educated classes. And in England this 
revival of ancient Christianity has not burst from among 
the sects where, having less confinement, it would sooner 
waste its infant strength ; but from the very heart of the 
established church, where salutarv corrective influences 
are as strong and steady as they can be. Farthermore, 
it has not, as in certain instances which might be men- 
tioned, been fomented among juniors, more zealous than 
discreet, and with whom the want of judgment, and the 
unconfessod impulses of hot ambition, might have com- 



40 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC. 

bined to cherish extravagance of conduct, and opinion— 
not with such have we now to do, but with men of ma- 
ture understanding, and of authenticated professional 
quality, and wliose official sentiments, tending more to- 
ward repose than agitation, must be supposed to out- 
weigh any irregular desires of notoriety. The writers 
of the Tracts for the Times, generally, have far more, 
in every sense, to risk, than they are likely to gain by 
the course they are pursuing. And finally, it is a cir- 
cumstance worthy of notice, and corroboratory of the 
general idea of our approaching an extraordinary and 
peculiar crisis of the church, that, if one of the English 
universities rather than the other could give sanction to 
doctrines and practices drawn from Christian antiquity, 
those maintained in the Tracts for the Times are ema- 
nating not from Cambridge — but from Oxford. 



SUBSTANCE OF THE ARGUMENT. 

Concisely expressed, the argument of the reforma- 
tion turned upon the alleged difference between the reli- 
gion of the middle ages, and that of the New Testament. 
The Romanist generally admitted this diversity, and yet 
maintained that, whatever constituted the difference, was 
binding upon the church: the reformers therefore had 
more to do with the principle of the authority which 
imposed this difference, than with the difference in its 
details, and uhich was confessed on all sides. 

Using, for the moment, a similar brevity of descrip- 
tion, it may be affirmed that the argument mooted by 



SUBSTANCE OF THE ARGUMENT. 41 

the writers of the Oxford Tracts, turns upon the differ- 
ence (if there be any) between the religion of the New 
Testament, and that of the pristine and martyr cliurch, 
which difference, if even it were ascertained, they would 
represent to be not merely innocent, but imitable. 

After exhibiting this discrepancy, there would remain 
to be discussed the very important question concerning 
the deference that is due, by the modern church, to the 
ancient church, on the alleged ground of its having pos- 
sessed, what we have lost, namely, the unwritten mind, 
and the practices of the apostolic age ; as well as those 
authoritative decisions, on various points of discipline 
and worship, to which, in their epistles, the apostles fre- 
quently refer, as well known, although not then and 
there specified. Whatever may be the consequences, 
or tendency of their modes of thinking, the Oxford wri- 
ters are not, like TertuUian, labouring to establish the 
equal authority of a perpetually emanating tradition, or 
a power of gradual development, granted to the church; 
but are simply affirming the authority of traditions 
known, or well surmised to be, strictly apostolical. 

Such, as I understand them, are the points we have 
to consider in the present argument. On all hands, 
within the protestant pale, the well ascertained usurpa- 
tions and corruptions of the Romish church are utterly 
discarded. What have we, in England, to do with the 
Gregorys, the Sylvesters, the Innocents, the Urbans, 
of Rome, or with the notions they favoured, or with the 
practices they enjoined? What part hath the bishop of 
Rome in these western islands ? Prove that he may 
lawfully command us, as his spiritual children, and we 
submit. 

But it is another thing to insulate ourselves from the 



43 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC. 

broad continent of ancient and Catholic Christianity: it is 
another thing to denounce, unexamined, whatever consti- 
tutes the gkring difference between our own Christian 
i:iity, and that of the times when men were living who 
had received their faith, at one or two removes, from 
the lips of the twelve. It is another thing to incur the 
risks of contemptuously discarding all that the Apos.^ 
ties might have recommended, or might have established, 
although only incidentally (or perhaps not at all) alluded 
to in their extant writings. 

With the indolent hope of evading laborious inqui- 
ries, and of escaping from endless discussions, and of 
effectively cutting every cord that ties us to Romanisni, 
with some such views as these, there may be those who 
would sink antiquity altogether, well content to reserve, 
just the canonical writings. But to do this, is, as I think 
may be proved, as impracticable a course, as it is bold, 
unwarrantable, and unnecessary. Nothing remains for 
us, I am persuaded, but to employ all that serious dili- 
gence and discrimination which we may be masters of, 
and which the importance of the occasion cajls for, in 
an extensive research of Christian antiquity. 

Admitting the general principle, which, as I now state 
it, maybe easily established, that a deference is actually 
due to the mind and testimony of the ancient church 
catholic, there remains to be determined, first — rthe chro- 
nological limits of that church; or the precise period 
within which it was in fact catholic, and entitled, as 
such, to respect; and secondly, what are the limitations 
under which this deference should be yielded, and this 
testimony listened to. Is reverence due to every thing 
that was generally believed and practised within the pre- 
cincts of the ancient church? If not, what are the ac- 



SUBSTANCE OF THE ARGUMENT. 4S 

tual exceptions; and what the rules that should guide us 
in making them? 

The writers of the Tracts for the Times have not as 
yet effected the indispensable preliminary work of de- 
fining the legitimate authority of the ancient church, and 
setting it clear of the many perplexities that attach to 
the subject. Until this be done, they, in asserting this 
authority, and others in impugning it, are beating the air. 

In the following pages an endeavour will be made, and 
will be repeated from different starting points, so to ex- 
hibit the real religious condition, and moral and spiritual 
characteristics of the ancient church, as may go far in 
aiding us to draw the line between a due, and an undue 
deference to this alleged authority. If I should be able 
to effect my intention, with any degree of success, I 
shall indulge the hope of relieving many wavering minds 
from their perplexities. 

Whatever analogies may seem to connect the doctrines 
of the Oxford Tracts with popery, the difference be- 
tween the two is such as that those must certainly be 
disappointed who, hastily snatching up the rusty swords 
and spears of the reformers, rush, so accoutred, upon 
the Oxford divines. To demolish popery (a work, as 
it has proved, not so easily accomplished as sonne had 
imagined) is only to leave the ancient Christianity of 
the Oxford writers in a fairer and loftier position. 

Nevertheless, as I have already said, if we can but 
clearly define and wall about the respect due to the an- 
cient church, and mark the points where suspicion is to 
come in the place of deference, almost every thing will 
have been done which mere argument can be supposed 
to effect in ridding the world of the illusions of the Ro- 
tnish superstition^ Our present labours then, arduous 



44 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC. 

as they may be, are animated by a most cheering hope. 
We have indeed a single subject in view; but we have 
a double purpose; and the ulterior intention of what we 
are proposing, challenges to itself a grandeur and a so- 
lemnity which must urge every motive of exertion to 
the highest pitch* The human mind can indeed admit 
no impulses more powerful than those which j)ress upon 
it when, as now, a new hope is presented of aiding in 
the destined overthrow of the horrid despotism of the 
papal heresy. 

Our subject then is not a biblical argument, or a ques- 
tion of interpretation; nor is it abstractedly theological^ 
much less metaphysical or philosophical; but is purely 
historical: and — -what we have to inquire about is — the 
actual condition of the Christian church from the apos- 
tolic times, and dov/nwards, toward the seventh cen- 
tury. 

— The history of Christianity! alas the ominous words, 
which sink like a mortal chill into the heart. Christi-^ 
anity has absolutely no difficulties, or none that ought 
for a moment to stagger a sound and well informed mind, 
none excepting such as attach to its history; but these^ 
although clearly separable from the question of its own 
divine origin, yet how serious and how disheartening" 
are they! The Christian, if he would enjoy any se- 
renity, should either know nothing of tlie history of his 
religion, or he should be acquainted with it so profoundly, 
as to have satisfied himself that the dark surmises which 
had tormented his solitary meditations, have no substan- 
tial bearing upon the principles of his faith. 

In truth these difficulties, whatever tiiey may be, when 
they come to be accurately examined, are found to press,- 



CHRISTIANITY AND ITS HISTORY. 45 

not upon Christianity itself, but upon certain too hastily 
assumed principles of natural theology, which they ap- 
pear to contradict. The general aspect of the gospel 
economy suggests expectations, as to the divine purposes 
toward mankind, at large, which not only have not hi- 
therto been justified by the actual course of human af- 
fairs, but which the very explicit predictions of our 
Lord, and of his apostles, had we properly regarded 
them, should have taught us not to entertain. After 
listening, in the first place, to the predictions of the Jew- 
ish prophets concerning the reign of the Messiah, and 
then to the song of the angelic choir, announcing the ac- 
tual birth of the Prince of Peace, if we turn, either to 
our Lord's public discourses, or to his private conversa- 
tions with his disciples, a very remarkable contrast pre- 
sents itself; and whether or not we may be successful 
in harmonizing the apparent discrepancy, it presents an 
alternative strikingly confirmatory of our faith as Chris- 
tians. For, in the first place, the perfectly unambigu- 
ous, and often repeated announcements made by Christ 
to his followers of persecutions, universal hatred, and 
cruel deaths which awaited those who were to promul- 
gate his doctrine, were the very reverse of what an un- 
inspired founder of a new faith would either himself 
have admitted, or would have ventured to hold beforo 
his early adherents. Then, and in the second place, these 
same announcements, when compared with the facts which 
make up the history of the church, stand forward as pro- 
phecies so fulfilled to the letter, as to vindicate the divine 
prescience of him who uttered them. 

In like manner the well known predictions contained 
in the apostolic epistles, and which speak of the cor- 
ruptions and the apostacies that should arise within the 

5 



46 ANCIENT' CHRISTIANITY, ETC. 

fchurch, ar6 available in this same two-fold manner, first,- 
as evidences of reality and sincerity on the part of the 
apostles, and as opposed to enthusiasm and guile, which 
Would have dictated things more fair and smooth; and, 
secondly, of a divinely imparted foreknowledge of the 
tsourse of events. 

Let it be granted then, that the history of Christianity: 
painfully contradicts the bright expectations we might 
have entertained of what the gospel was to be, and io 
ido. But does it in any particle contradict our Lord's 
own forewarnings, or the apostles' explicit predictions 
concerning the fate and position of its adherents in this 
world of evil? Assuredly not. 

These general observations, often as they have been 
advanced by Christian writers, might be considered as 
impertinent in this place as to their ordinary bearing; 
but they contain an inference peculiarly significant in re- 
lation to our immediate object. Let me say then, that, 
without prejudging the scheme of ecclesiastical princi- 
ples which we are now proposing to sift, we may at 
least affirm that it assumes and supposes a state of things 
in the early church, much more in accordance with the fond 
and vague expectations just referred to, than either with 
the well defined predictions of Paul, Peter, and Jude, or 
with the pages of church history. Now this diff'erence 
should be noted, and it should lead those who hitherto 
have overlooked it, to give the more earnest attention to 
the details of an inquiry, the intention of which is to 
discover whether ancient Christianity was, in fact, what 
we should have rejoiced to find it, or, on the contrary, 
what the apostolic prophecies would have led us sorrow- 
fully to look for. 

If at any time, or if in any particular instance, the aii^ 



CHRISTIANITY AND ITS HISTORY. 47 

thority of the ancient church is to be urged upon the 
modern church, then surely there is a pertinence in turn- 
ing to the apostolic prophecies of perversions, corrup- 
tions, apostacies, quickly to spring up within the sacred 
enclosure itself, which meet us at the threshold, and 
seem to bring us under a most solemn obligation to look 
to it, lest, amid the fervours of an indiscriminate reverence, 
"we sei^e for imitation the very things which the apostles 
foresav/ and forewarned the church of, as fatal errors! 

No practical caution, as it seems to me, can be much 
more clear, as to its propriety, or important in itself, 
than the one I now insist upon. Say, we are about 
to open the original and authentic records of ancient 
Christianity, and in doing so, have a specific intention to 
compare our modern Christianity therewith, and to re- 
dress it, if necessary, in accordance with the pristine 
niodel. But at this moment the apostolic predictions, 
like a handwriting on the w^all, brighten before our eyes, 
in characters of terror. We are entering a wide field, 
upon the skirts of which a friendly hand has posted the 
— *' Beware of pits and swamps, even on the beaten paths 
of this sacred ground." To addict oneself to the study of 
ancient Christianity, with a credulous, antiquarian ve- 
neration, regardless of the apostolic predictions, is to 
lay oneself down to sleep upon the campagna, after 
having been told tjiat the whole region exhales a malig- 
nant miasma: the fate of one so infatuated, would not be 
more sure, than merited. 

Nevertheless these cautions, which common discretion 
not less than piety suggest and confirm, are misunder- 
stood if they are used to discourage any researches 
which our extant materials afford the means of prose- 
cuting. The scoffer and skeptic, casting a hasty glance 



48 ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY, ETC. 

upon church history, and looking, by instinct of his per- 
sonal tastes, to the scum and the froth, turns away in ar- 
rogant disgust: but the Christian may not do the same. 
On the other side, the unlearned believer, finding, in 
church history, if he looks into it at all, what revolts his 
feelings, clasps his bible to his bosom, with a renewed 
affection, and resolves to know notliing else: and it may 
be an ill-advised zeal that would disturb such a resolu- 
tion. 

Mean time, Christians of cultivated minds, and pecu- 
liarly all who stand forward as the teachers of Christi- 
anity, owe it to themselves, and to others, to free them- 
selves from the many perils of ignorance, on this parti- 
cular ground; — and on no ground is it more dangerous 
to be ignorant or to be imperfectly informed. It is a 
happy omen of the present times, that this ignorance, or 
slender information lately attaching to all but here and 
there a solitary and secluded antiquary, is now being ra- 
pidly dispersed; so that on all sides, those who addict 
themselves to theological studies, whether exegetical, 
dogmatic, or ecclesiastical, are turning, with an animated 
and sedulous zeal, to the remains of ancient Christian li- 
terature. Some, perhaps with an overweening reverence, 
and others with a predetermined contempt; but more than 
a few, are, with a well directed and intelligent curiosity, 
turning over the long neglected tomes that imbody the 
history of our religion: and it is a remarkable fact that, 
at this moment, these laborious inquiries, set on foot by 
peculiar circumstances, in each instance, are pursued in 
Germany, in France, and in England. The combined 
result (for the several results must meet at length in one 
issue) cannot but effect some momentous changes in each 
of these countries; nor is it easy to exclude the expecta- 



CHRISTIANITY AND ITS HISTORY. 49 

tion of consequences which must affect the religious con- 
dition of Europe, and of the world. 

Among ourselves, however, there are too many who, 
whether from motives of indolence, which one must be re- 
luctant to impute, or from a dim forethought of some pro- 
bable and undesired consequences, hold back from the 
studies which others are so honourably prosecuting. 
Looking at the Christian world at large, it is my full con- 
viction, that there is just now a far more urgent need of 
persuasives to the study of Christian history and literature, 
than of cautions against the abuse of such studies. Too 
many feel and speak as if they thought there were no 
continuity in their religion; or as if there were no uni- 
versal church; or as if the individual Christian, with his 
pocket bible in his hand, need fix his eyes upon nothing 
but the little eddy of his personal emotions; or as if Chris- 
tianity were not what it is its glory and its characteristic 
to be — a religion of history. 

Christianity, the pledge to man of eternity, is the oc- 
cupant of all time; and not merely was it, itself, the ripen- 
ing of the dispensations that had gone before it, but it 
was to be the home companion of the successive genera- 
tions of man, until the consummation of all things. Not 
to know Christianity as the religion of all ages — as that 
which grasps and interprets the cycles of time, is to be 
in a condition like that of the man whose gloomy cham- 
ber admits only a single pencil of the universal radiance 
of noon. 

The eager, forward-looking temper of these stirring 
times, has withdrawn Christians, far too much, from the 
quieting recollection that they themselves are members 
of a series, and portions of a mass; nor do we, so much 
or so often as might be well, entertain the solemn me-» 

5* 



60 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

dilation, that we, individually, are hastening to join the 
general assembly of those who, from age to age, have 
stood where we now stand, as the holders and profes- 
sors of God's truth in the world. Is there no irreligion, 
no want of faiih and fervour, indicated by a voluntary 
and utter ignorance of those into whose company, within 
a (ew months, or years, we are to be thrown? 

Our Christianity is not a system of philosophy, or ab- 
stract principles, broached, no one cares when, and having 
no visible attachments to place, time, or persons, and 
which, as it is pregnant with no hopes, is rich with no 
records. Again, it stands vividly contrasted with false 
religions of all names, which, contradicted as they are 
by genuine history, in what concerns their origin, are 
throughout every year and century of their continuance, 
more and more belied by the course of events; and are, 
as time runs on, loosening their precarious hold of the 
convictions of their adherents, by iiluding^ more and 
more, their expectations. Christianity is the reverse of 
all this, in its form, and in the mode of its conveyance, 
and in tlie sentiments which it generates. Its own con- 
stant tendency is to gather, not to scatter; and not merely 
does it, or would it, bind its true adherents, of each age, 
in a visible communion; but it knits together, in one, by 
a retrospective and anticipative feeling, the children of 
God, who are dispersed through all periods of time. 

Because it is of the very essence of truth in religion, 
to blend itself with a certain series of events, and to mix 
itself with history, example more than precept, biog- 
raphy more than abstract doctrine, are made to convey 
to us, in the scriptures, the various elements of piety. 
Trutii in religion, is something that has been acted and 
transacted; it is something that has been imbodied in 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 51 

persons and societies; and so intimately does this condi- 
tion of CONTINUITY attach to tiie gospel scheme, that the 
inspired narrative of the past, runs on without a break, 
into the announcement of the future; so as that the en- 
tire destinies of the human family — a part narrated, and 
a part foretold, a part brought under the direct beams of 
history, and a part dimly adumbrated in prophecy, are 
grasped by it, and claimed as its possession. 

One m.ust be really perplexed when one sees the Chris- 
tian, with an historic bible in his hand, and who, by its 
aid, commands a prospect over all the heids of time, and 
far into the regions of eternity, yet thinking that certain 
intermediate periods of the great cycle of God's dispen- 
sations are nothing to him; or that he may as well be ut- 
terly ignorant of large tracts of this extensive course, as 
know them. The forming an acquaintance, so far as 
we possess the means of opening it, with our brethren, 
and fellow citizens, and precursors, in the Christian com- 
monwealth, we owe to their virtues and sufferings; and 
we owe it also to their errors and illusions; and if they 
themselves, we may be sure, could now send us a mes- 
sage of love, it would relate much rather to the errors 
against which we should be cautioned, than to the vir- 
tues of which we may find brighter examples in scrip- 
lure itself. 

But there is even a more serious, and pointed motive, 
urging upon the ministers of religion, especially, a de- 
vout and careful study of churcii history ; and it is a 
motive which has a very particular bearing upon the dif- 
ficult inquiries we have now in view. What then is 
church history (and es])ecially what would it be, if our 
materials were more ample) but a running commentary 
upon our Lord's most solemn promise, to be with his 



52 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

servants always, even to the end of the world ? These 
words, sacred as they are, and peculiar, as having been 
littered at the most remarkable moment of all time (if 
only that of the second advent be expected) can have no 
meaning, or none that can render them important to our- 
selves, if we are not to look into church history for their 
veritication. 

Ttiis promise, so emphatically uttered, with whatever 
benefits it may teem, was not given without a clear pre- 
science of the very things that most oflend and perplex 
us in the records of Christianity. Not a heresy that has 
troubled the church, not any outburst of pride and pas- 
sion among divines, that has disgraced it, no illusion 
that has seduced the few, and none that has infatuated 
tiie many, or even the church at large, throughout the 
h^pse of ages, was unforeseen by him who thus formally 
engaged to be with and near his ministers, in the long 
succession of their office, until he comes again. How 
is it possible to think less than this ? Or how, if we 
think it, can we be incurious concerning the actual indi- 
cations of that divine presence from age to age? 

But the difficulty is this: — these indications of the 
Lord's presence with his church, have not been such as 
we should have expected to find them ;•— the Lord has 
not seemed to surround himself with the men whom we 
should have chosen for his companions: and those cap- 
tious words are almost on our lips; — '*This man keepeth 
company with publicans and sinners." Now it is pre- 
cisely in connexion with some such uneasy feelings as 
these — that many pious persons entertain prejudices 
which have a very unfavourable influence upon their 
religious character ; and it relates immediately to the 
great questions now before us to lay the axe to the root 



UPON THE AXCIENT CHURCH. 53 

of such notions. Let us then consider our actual posi- 
tion in this instance. 

— When in any case, a well known friend, or a teacher 
and guide, or a prince and patron, acts in the very way 
which we had anticipated, and when he says and does 
very nearly what we should have imagined him to say 
and do, under given circumstances, we stand on one side, 
with a quiet, incurious acquiescence, just as we watch 
the rising and the setting of the sun, when his undevi- 
ating revolutions bring him, at the wonted moment, to the 
line of the horizon. But how different are our feelings, 
and how much more intense and wakeful is our attention 
if, while we still confidently rely upon what we know 
of his wisdom, and goodness, he starts aside from the 
path we had presumed to mark out for him, and holds a 
course which confounds every notion we had entertained 
of his character and purposes ! — In any such case, we 
rouse ourselves from our previous listlessness, and, with 
an eager, anxious, intentness of mind, we watch every 
movement, listen to every word he utters, and we note, 
even the least considerable circumstances of his beha- 
viour ; his every gesture fixes our eye, and we let no- 
thing escape us which may perhaps afford some indica- 
tion of those hidden reasons which v/ili at length explain 
this unlooked for course of conduct. Do we not tho- 
roughly know our friend, patron, prince? May we not 
hope then, that, sooner or later, we shall find the means 
of truly interpreting the enigmas of his administration. 
The application of such a supposed case is obvious, 
in this instance. If it be true that the general complex- 
ion of church history, through the course of long cen- 
turies, is such as to offend our preconceived notions, 
and to shock our spiritual tastes, and if, while we bend 



54 THE DEPIINDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

oyer the records of those dim eras, the promise of the 
Lord to he with his servants, still rings in our ears, as a 
doleful knell of hopes broken ; if it be so, or, as far as 
such may he the fact, the motive becomes more impres- 
sive and serious which impels us to acquire an authentic 
knowledge of this course of events, in all its details, — 
and if tliere are any who must acknowledge that they 
feel a peculiar repugnance in regard to church history, 
they are the very persons, more than any other, whom 
it behooves to school themselves in this kind of learning; 
for it seems more than barely probable, that this distaste 
springs from some ill affection of their own minds, de- 
nianding to be exposed and remedied. Such persons 
rnay well admit the supposition that they have hastily 
assumed certain notions of their Lord's principles of 
government, which are in fact unlike what, at length, 
they will find themselves to be subject to ; and if so, 
the sooner they dispel any such false impressions, the 
better. On the face of the instance supposed, one 
should s^^y, that any perplexities we may feel in regard 
to that course of events which constitutes the history of 
Christianity, probably spring from some deep-seated error 
of feeling, or of opinion, which, for our own sakes, we 
should carefully analyze. 

Reasons such as these, ought to be enough to engage 
the ministers of religion, at least, in the labour of ob- 
taining as much familiarity as their more urgent duties 
will allow, with the records of our faith, from age to 
age. Other motives, very obvious, and often adverted 
to, belong rather to individuals, addicting themselves, 
from personal taste, or professional obligation, to specific 
studies, and who will not stop short of a thorough 
knowledge of the subject. To some of these technical 



tJPON THE ANCIENT CHURCli. 6 5 

bses of church history, I shall have occasion prepently 
to advert; but these pursuits have yet another, and a 
general recommendation, which I do not remember to 
have seen insisted upon, although it is not in itself incon- 
siderable, and is very proper in this place to be adduced^ 
when our inquiries are to involve some of the most in- 
tricate principles of human nature, as wrought upon by 
religious motives. 

In all cases, then, in which the materials of history 
are copious, as well as authentic, it holds good as a rule^ 
that the practical utility of each portion of it bears a 
direct proportion to the degree in which, among the' 
people, or within the community so reported, the variotis 
elements of human nature have been developed. A low 
or contracted development of human nature, involves a 
barren and profitless narrative of events : nothing can b^ 
more parched, or destitute of nutriment, than tiie story 
of the fortunes and misfortunes of savage, or semi-bar- 
barous nations : a page or two, comprising the broad 
facts of the soc^ial condition of such coriimunities, affords 
all the instruction we could derive from a volume, were 
it written. In truth, although there may be pictures of 
the imperfectly civilized races, there can be no history 
of ihem. It is Greece that may have a history, where 
the human mind spreads itself out, like a superb flower, 
fronting the sun, until the most delicate tints, and the 
finest structure of its inmost recesses are laid open : and 
the same is true of Rome, and Italy, and modern Europe. 
Now on this very principle^ although, in comparing 
church history with that of civil societies, the former 
must be granted to want, almost entirely, the brilliancy, 
and movement, that give an untiring charm to the latter, 
yet has- it its prerogative, and a high one (if solid instruc- 



56 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

tion be sought for) and it is this, that it exhibits men to 
to our view, as wroiigh.t upon by motives at once more 
profound, and less easily understood, than any other 
motives. False religions have indeed turned up human 
nature from its depths, in a manner never eOected by 
interests that were merely secular. But true religion, 
beside its power in common with the false, to animate 
llie deepest seated emotions, has exhibited these occult 
elements in combination, and in contrast with, emotions 
altogether peculiar to itself, and which, without its aid 
would lay latent and unsuspected, beneath the soil of 
human nature, from age to age. It is Christianity, and 
nothing else could do it, that has shown man all that is 
in his heart. No other stage of human affairs exhibits hu- 
man nature, as this does, displaying, now the virtues that 
ally man to God, and now the dark passions that seem 
to render him the fit associate and minister of fiends. 
What line of history then can be equal to church history, 
for instructiveness ? Thus it must be ordinarily; but 
it is peculiarly so, as often as occasions arise in which 
what may be new to ourselves, who are but of yester- 
day, may be found, in its type or pattern, on this or that 
page of the records of the church. On such occasions, 
more perhaps than in any other, those possess a great 
advaiitage over their brethren, whose minds are already 
richly stored with a well digested mass of instances, 
applicable to the novelties (or apparent novelties) of 
whatever kind, which, from time to time, blaze out to 
alarm the timid, and to allure the simple. A ready recol- 
lection oi" tlie ancient guise of the very same substantial 
error or folly, is all that we need, in many cases, for 
allaying our fears, or for securing us against the infatua- 
tion which affects others, or for suggesting the remedies 



^il 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 57 

that are to be employed. Under circumstances more or 
less strictly analogous, we have the invaluable opportu- 
nity of seeing how our predecessors have discharged 
their duty, or have compromised it. 

The canonical adage — '' nothing new under the sun," 
holds good in a peculiar sense within the precincts of 
the church, and it does so for an obvious reason. What 
is new, or rather what seems to be new, in the manifold 
up-turnings of human affairs, springs from some less- 
lisual combination of the thousand lighter impulses that 
are at work within our bosoms, and these impulses, be- 
cause they are so many, and because the individual 
varieties of disposition are indefinitely numerous, will 
be throwing out, from time to time, rare conjunctions of 
temper and of circumstance. But now those deeper prin- 
ciples of our moral and intellectual nature to which 
Christianity addresses itself, are very (ew, and the ele- 
ments of truth also are few; and hence, by necessity, 
the clianges of which the two, in combination, are sus- 
ceptible are comparatively few, and therefore must seve- 
rally be of more frequent recurrence. 

There is little risk in affirming that the first five cen- 
turies, or we might say, the first three of the Christian 
history, comprise a sample of every form and variety of 
intellectual or moral aberration of which human nature 
is at all susceptible, under the influence of religious 
excitement. No great ingenuity therefore can be needed 
in matching any modern form of error or extravagance, 
with its like, to be produced from the museum of an- 
tique specimens. And how much relief, under any new 
perplexity, may be derived from such recognitions, those 
can best tell who are the best furnished with the requi- 
site erudition. If then there were no other recommenda- 
tion of these studies, the one now referred to would be 

6 



58 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

enough to repay all the labours which they involve. J 
venture to add that, in the momentous and intricate 
questions to which we are now addressing ourselves, a. 
fair use of antiquity, as a copia instantiarum, will carry 
us safely and undoubtingly through every strait. 

Or if there are, or have been agitators of the repose 
of the church, who would resent any recurrence to an- 
tiquity, as applicable to themselves, and who would not 
be afraid to denounce any appeal to it as futile, super- 
stitious, and impertinent, the parties with whom we 
have now to do, not merely admit the propriety of such 
a reference, but arc the most forward to invite it ; 
making it their boast that the image of what they are^ 
or what they would fain be, may be contemplated in the 
fair glass of antiquity. Nothing remains then but that 
they, and their opponents, should together look into that 
glass. 

These indispensable studies, have, in fact, been revived 
of late, to a great extent, in our own, as well as other 
countries ; while the use and necessity of them are forced 
anew upon tfie minds of all by the rapid and unexpected, 
advances of Romanism, whose ministers are taking ad- 
vantage of that ignorance of antiquity which has toa 
long been the reproach of protestantism. 

So much importance attaches, at the present moment^ 
to ecclesiastical learning, that it must not be deemed, 
impertinent, in this place, to exliibit the futility of cer- 
tain suppositions on the ground of which many excuse 
their slight acquaintance with it. 

In the first place then, it is often roundly affirmed, 
that we may know as much of the history of our reli- 
gion as can avail us for any practical purposes, through 
the medium of some one or more of our modern com- 
pilations — called histories of the church. Now to this 



U^ON THE AXCIENT CHURCH. 59 

assumption it might be taken as a very sufficient reply, 
that we have at present to do, as well in the instance of 
the Oxford divines, as in that of the Romanists, with 
men who know vastly more of Christian antiquity than 
is to be gathered from such sources. Can we then 
imagine it to be safe to enter into controversy with our 
antagonists, less well-informed than they are? Besides, 
since the time when most of those compilations were 
given to the world, the views of the best informed per- 
sons, on the general subject of historical composition, 
have undergone a great change ; so that even the most 
able and noted of our writers, in this line, have lost very 
much of the esteem which they once enjoyed; that is 
to say, as historians. Who, now-a-days, thinks it is 
enough to know just as much of history as Hume, or 
Hobertson, may inform him of? History, to subserve 
its serious practical uses, is not to be conveyed in broad 
generalities, or in the rounded periods of a philosophical 
digest: it is not a landscape painting of gay forms, and 
well-grouped masses ; but a sedulous adduction of ge- 
nuine materials, such as shall enable us, so far as re- 
moteness of time admits, to understand, as well the ac- 
actual condition of the mass of mankind, at different 
«ras, as the motives and conduct of those who have con- 
trolled public events. 

And if nothing less than this sort of elaborate prepa- 
ration can be accepted in the walks of secular history, 
assuredly we need rather a larger measure than a less, 
to render ecclesiastical history of much avail ; and espe- 
cially for this reason that, in what relates to religion, 
the intimate character and motives of men are, relatively, 
more important, as compared with their overt acts, or 
public conduct, than in civil affairs ; while, at the same 
time, these interior facts are liable to be more disguised. 



60 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODEr.N CHURCH 

Statesmen may be truly estimated, much more easily 
than churchmen, and yet a just estimation of the latter is 
much more important for securing the ends of history, 
than it can be of the former. We cannot therefore stand 
excused from the task of carefully considering the entire 
mass of extant materials of church history, if we wish 
to secure any valuable result of sound wisdom, as the 
fruit of our labour. 

Allowing every merit that can fairly be claimed for 
our modern church histories, to what immense deduc- 
tions are they not liable, if considered as mirrors of 
Christian antiquity ? The ecclesiastical and theological 
prejudices of some of these writers, and their pledged 
subserviency to particular interests, the utter want of 
religious feeling in others, the superstition of some, and 
the active fanaticism of a few, are enough to justify our 
passing them by, one and all, if what we have in view 
be a genuine acquaintance with the subject. Besides, 
if such works embrace the sixteen or eighteen centuries 
of Christianity, those periods that are in fact the most 
important, — nay, almost exclusively important, must be 
confined within limits much too narrow ; and even this 
scanty allotment of pages, has, in most instances, been 
still farther restricted by the admission of tedious disqui- 
sitions, on subsidiary points, of no intrinsic value — as 
whether a martyrdom occurred in this, or the next year; 
or whether a senseless heresy included, or did not in- 
clude, such or such an unintelligible dogma ! points which 
are dismissed at last with the ingenuous confession, that 
they are neither of much consequence, nor susceptible 
of any conclusive determination! 

But even if we could name a modern history of Chris- 
tianity, exempt from all such faults and deficiencies, it 
would still be nothing better than — a si2iiemeni, prepared 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 61 

and digested, and therefore less than what is indispen- 
sable, when momentous questions come to hinge upon a 
true and exact knowledge of antiquity. The reading a 
modern church history, supposing it to combine every 
excellence, if compared with the perusal of the entire 
and original materials whence that history was drawn, 
and of which it is a digest, might not unfitly be likened 
to the listening, in chancery, to a body of written affi- 
davits, and statements of facts, carefully and profession- 
ally dressed up, and moulded with a special intention; 
such a body of evidence, compared with the hearing and 
seeing of the actual witnesses, in a court of law. In 
the one case the most astute professional sagacity often 
fails to reach the naked truth ; while in the other, an 
honest and intelligent juryman, conversant with human 
nature, wants no assistance, ordinarily, in discerning 
the true from the false. 

The point I am now insisting upon I feel to be of 
great practical importance in relation to the wide range 
of controversies which we have in view; for it is my 
firm conviction, that nothing will be brought to a satis- 
factory conclusion until the moral and spiritual condition 
of the early church has been fully laid open. But, in 
innumerable instances, it is found that a just and vivid 
conception of things or persons, remote, that is to say 
— the very truth, apart from which all else that we may 
know is substantially false, comes before us, unlooked 
for. and while, perhaps, we may have been listlessly 
threading our way down a lifeless page. And such 
casual indications, or revelations, as one might call them, 
of the naked truth, are more likely than not to be passed 
over by the grave compiler of history, as unworthy of 
his dignified regard, or as altogether trivial. 

It might, indeed, seem as if a judicious selection from 

6* 



62 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

the Greek and Latin church writers, would sufficiently 
secure tlie benefits to be derived, even from the perusal 
of the whole of them, thus saving the time and cost of 
doing so. But a moment's consideration will expose 
the fallaciousness of such a supposition ; for even allow- 
ing the utmost discretion to him who undertakes the task 
of selection, on what principle, let it be asked, is that 
selection likely to be made ? It must be replied that, at 
once the pious tastes of the editor, and his solicitude to 
provide, in the best manner he can, for the combined 
edification and pleasure of his readers (of the religious 
public such as it is) will prompt, nay compel him, to cull 
ihe/toii^ers of sacred literature, as he goes ; and to leave, 
where he finds them, the weeds. In a word, he will 
gather, as most proper for his purpose, whatever an in- 
telligent and pious reader would spontaneously distin- 
guish, with a margin pencil line, as worthy of a second 
perusal. Ail this may be well enough, if the mere per- 
sonal edification of the private Christian be in view; 
but what sort of provision is it, which is thus made for 
acquiring a safe and competent knowledge of the merits 
and ciiaracter of the actors in church history? Misera- 
bly will any one be deluded who trusts himself to any 
such culled materials ! I think more than a few of the 
passages I shall presently have occasion to cite, how 
pertinent soever they may be in regard to the questions 
at issue, are of a kind that would never have found a 
place in any selection from the fathers. Nay, these pas- 
sages reveal facts which the compilers of church history 
have studiously concealed from their readers. 

If we are anxious to know what the church was at 
any time, and what its teachers and masters were, then 
the more judicious (in one sense) such a selection may 
be, the more effectively will it lead us astray: the choicest 



r^* 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 63 

collection, made on any such principle, would be the 
most mendacious, regarded as testimony. Such a col- 
lection, considered as a material of history, is a splen- 
did vapour, hovering as a glare of seductive light, over 
a swamp. Materials so brought together, are just what 
a body of evidence, produced in court, would be, if an 
advocate were allowed to bring forward every thing in 
which the witnesses are agreed, and to suppress every 
thing in which they differ. Yet it is precisely by the 
sifting of the discrepancies in testimony that truth is eli- 
cited. 

So far as Christianity is the same in all ages, and in 
all hearts, truly admitting its influence, there must be 
very much, in the writings of all Christian men (what- 
ever system they may have lived under) which, in the 
highest and best sense of the word, is catholic; and it 
is just this catholic element, or genuine portion of such 
writings, that recommends itself to our pious sympa- 
thies, meet it where we may, and which therefore will 
be seized upon by right-minded collectors of the golden 
sayings of good men. But now it is precisely toward 
the discordant portions of ancient Christian writings that 
the keen eye of historic industry should be directed. It 
is not the choice portions, but the refuse, not the sound, 
but the unsound, not the symmetrical, but the disfigured, 
not the wisdom, so much as the folly, that we have need 
to scrutinize, and to trace to its origin. Without a pa- 
radox it may be affirmed that, in labouring to know what 
the Christian body really v\^as, in any age, it is what is 
(in a sense) impertinent, that will prove the most perti- 
nent to our purpose. In a word, it is less the sameness, 
than the difference, which we should be looking for. 
Do we not well know that, in matters of religion, what 
appears the fairest, demands often the nicest sifting; 



64 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

and that, to be credulous, is to be duped, until we are 
driven to doubt of evevy thing. Those, therefore, who 
know, in matters of church history, only what modern 
writers may please to have reported, stand exposed to a 
cruel shock, and a sad trial of their principles, should it 
ever happen to them to learn a little more. 

Nor ought any translation to be confided in, as conclu- 
sive evidence, in historical disquisitions; for we have not 
merely to guard against wilful perversions of the sense 
of ancient authors, and the many oversights to which 
every translator is liable, but against the constant illu- 
sion of attributing, to certain words and phrases, neces- 
sarily employed by the translator, a modern instead of 
an ancient sense. A translation may be literal, or it may 
be free, and in fact the best possible in its kind, and yet 
may convey to the modern ear notions substantially dif- 
fering from those which were attached to the equivalents, 
by the ancient writer, and his reader. And thus it is, 
and must be, because the language of every people is not 
a universal medium of ideas and notions, common to 
mankind; but is the instrument of a particular set of 
minds, nicely adapted to its occasions, and whenever 
employed by energetic writers, is much more specific, 
than generic; and therefore is insusceptible of transla- 
tion, in the direct proportion in which it may be worth 
translating. 

The earliest Christian writers, who, most of them, can 
claim very little regard on account of any excellencies of 
style, or even of matter, but whose evidence is of the ut- 
most consequence in ecclesiastical discussions, suffer pe- 
culiarly in a translation; for a false taste, and a dialect 
in which the most incongruous elements were mingled — 
jumbled together, fill them with unpleasing turns of ex- 
pression, which, when ihey come to be literally rendered 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 65 

(and a free version is not in these instances admissible) 
make them absohitely repulsive, so that the perusal in a 
translation, is more wearisome than it seems in the ori- 
ginal. The writers, inestimable as they are on account 
of their testimony (the preservation of which ought to 
be regarded as an instance of providential interposition, 
for subserving important ends) these writers are not to 
be known, to any good purpose, otherwise than in their 
own language. There is no alternative, in the present 
instance, but that of manfully addressing ourselves to a 
task of some labour and difficulty. The controversies 
upon which the church is now entering, are of vital con- 
sequence: the doubts propounded are inveterate, and any 
course that may be taken, at the suggestion of indolence 
and impatience, and which may seem at first to be sum- 
mary and sufficient, will prove, as I venture to predict, 
to be as unavailing as trite and meager. At a time when, 
in the pursuit of secular interests, men in all professions 
are making unheard-of eflbrts, and are undergoing la- 
bours which our fathers did not dream of, ought it to be 
considered as a great thing if those to whom the preser- 
vation and defence of sacred truths are committed, should 
be expected to be fully masters of the subject they have 
to do with? The perusal, through and through, of the 
Greek and Latin writers, of the first six centuries, is a 
labour not to be compared with those undergone, in the 
course of his education and early practice, by every ac- 
complished lawyer. 

Another common, but very unfounded impression, re- 
lative to the extant remains of Christian antiquity (the 
prevalence of which, at the present time, would leave 
a most dangerous advantage in the hands of those whom 
we are to w^ithstand) is to this effect: That the Greek 
and Latin fathers were men of intellect so slender, and 



66 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

are generally either so inane, or so absurd, or so erro- 
neous, that the perusal of them, except by a few curi- 
ous antiquaries, is a sheer waste of time; or at least that 
it can never repay the toil. Or it is affirmed, that, so 
far as these writers were sound and judicious, the same 
sentiments, better expressed, may be met with much 
nearer home, and in our own language. Or, generally, 
that whatever accomplishments the ministers of religion 
may possess, they may, in these days of benevolent ac- 
tivity, employ their time to better advantage than in 
brushintr the dust from neglected folios. The course of 
events is hastening to offer a startling refutation of any 
such frivolous assumptions. 

It is not, we may be sure, those who possess much 
of this indispensable learning, that in any such way set 
it at naught; and it is an acknowledged rule, in all 
walks of science and literature, that the scoffs and cap- 
tious objections of the ignorant need not be seriously 
replied to — ** know what you are speaking of, and then 
contemn it." Now the mere fact of applying any com- 
prehensive terms, either of admiration or contempt, to 
a body and series of writers, stretching through seven 
hundred or a thousand years, and these writers, natives 
as they were of distant countries, some of them simple 
and rude, while others were erudite and accomplished, 
may be taken as a proof of heedlessness, regarding the 
matter in hand, sufficient to excuse a silent disregard of 
the objection it involves. These '' fathers," thus grouped 
as a little band, by the objectors, were some of them men 
of as brilliant genius as any age has produced; some, 
commanding a flowing and vigorous eloquence, some, 
an extensive erudition, some, conversant with the great 
world, some, whose meditations had been ripened by 
years of seclusion, some of them the only historians of 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH, 67 

the times in which they lived, some, the chiefs of the 
philosophy of their age; and, if we are to speak of the 
whole, as a series or body of writers, they are the men 
M'ho, during a long era of deepening barbarism, still held 
the lamp of knowledge and learning, and, in fact, afford 
us almost all that we can now know, intimately, of the 
condition of the nations surrounding the Mediterranean, 
from the extinction of the classic fire, to the time of its 
rekindling in the fourteenth century. The church was 
the ark of all things that had life, during a deluge of 
seven hundred years. 

Such is ihe group w^hich is often conveniently dis- 
missed with a concise phrase of contempt by some! It 
may be suspected that very many of the delighted ad- 
mirers of the History of the Decline and Fall of the 
Roman Empire, are little aw^are of the extent of Gib- 
bon's obligations to — the fathers. Were it possible to 
draw off from that seductive work the entire materials 
derived by the indefatigable author from the ecclesias- 
tical compartment of his library, it is no small propor- 
tion of ihe splendour, the accuracy, the correct draw- 
ing, the vivid colouring, which are its charm and praise, 
that would be found wantino^. Well would it have been 
if some of the professed champions and historians of 
Christianity, had been as thoroughly conversant with the 
remains of Christian antiquity as was its most dangerous 
assailant. 

The ignorance of which we are here complaining ha& 
once endangered our faith as Christians; and it is now 
endangering our faith as protestants. 

Nearly of the same quality, and usually advanced by 
the same parties, is the portentous insinuation, or the 
bold and appalling averment, that there was little or no 
genuine Christianity in the world from the times of Jus- 



68 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

tin Martyr to those of Wicliffe, or of Luther! and the 
inference from this assumption is, that we are far more 
likely to be led astray' than edified by looking into the 
literature of this vast territory of religious darkness. 

I must leave it to those who entertain any such som- 
bre belief as this, to repel, in the best manner they are 
able, those fiery darts of infidelity w^hich will not fail to 
be hurled at Christianity itself, as often as the opinion is 
professed. Such persons, too, must expound as they 
can, our Lord's parting promise to his servants. 

Notions of this sort, and there are many of like kind, 
all take their rise from some narrow and sectarian hy- 
pothesis concerning Christianity. We do not, perhaps, 
find, during certain cycles of the church's history, that 
style or dialect, which, by an intimate association of 
ideas, has combined itself with our religious sentiments ; 
and therefore, it is to us, and our peculiar feelings, as if 
Christianity itself had actually not been extant at such 
times. If these are our feelings, it is well that we get 
rid of them with all speed. Christianity is absolute 
truth, bearing with various effect, from age to age, upon 
our distorted and discoloured human nature, but never 
so powerfully pervading the foreign substance it enters 
as to undergo no deflections itself, or to take no stains; 
and as its influence varies, from age to age, in intensity, 
as well as in the particular direction it may take, so does 
it exhibit, from age to age, great variations of form and 
hue. But the men of any one age indulge too much the 
overweening temper that attaches always to human na- 
ture, when they say to themselves — our Christianity is 
absolute Christianity; but that of such or such an age, 
was a mere shadow of it. 

Let Christians, whose characteristic it should be not 
to think more highly of themselves than is meet, cherish 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 69 

a very different feeling, and be willing to open, if I may- 
say so, a kindly communion with their brethren of dis- 
tant times. Surely far too little of this sympathy is felt 
by many who, because the authority of the early church 
has been overstrained and perversely employed by Ro- 
manists, have almost learned to feel toward their brethren 
of the early ages, as their adversaries in a controversy, 
just as a man is apt to harbour a grudge against a good 
neighbour who happens to have been subpoenaed by his 
enemy, to give evidence against him in a suit. If the 
fathers have given a handle to popery, we must remem- 
ber they little knew what it was to which they were 
giving a handle. 

It will presently be my task — a task not to be evaded, 
to adduce evidence in proof of the allegation that certain 
extensive and very mischievous illusions affected the 
Christianity of the ancient church; nevertheless, the very 
men whose example must now be held up as a caution, 
were, many of them, Christians not less than ourselves, 
nay, some of the most deluded by particular errors, were 
eminent Christians. Nothing is easier (or more edifying, 
in the inference it carries) than to adduce instances of 
exalted virtue, piety, constancy, combined with what all 
must now admit to have been an infatuated attachment 
to pernicious errors. Yet may our brethren of the early 
church well challenge our respect as well as affection: 
for theirs was the fervour of a steady faith in things un- 
seen and eternal; theirs a meek patience and humility, 
under the most grievous wrongs; theirs the courage to 
maintain a good profession before the frowning face of 
philosophy, of secular tyranny, and of splendid super- 
stition ; theirs was abstractedness from the world, and a 
painful self-denial; theirs the most arduous and costly 
labours of love ; theirs a munificence in charity, altoge- 

7 



70 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

ther without example; theirs was a reverent and scrupu- 
lous care of the sacred writings, and this merit, if they 
had had no other, is of a superlative degree, and should 
entitle them to the veneration and grateful regards of the 
modern church. How little do many readers of the Bi- 
ble, now-a-days, think of what it cost the Christians of 
the second and third centuries, merely to rescue and 
hide the sacred treasure from the rage of the heathen ! 

While, as yet, every thing in the church, and in the 
world, was precisely what the Lord had given them 
reason to look for, while Christians were still a rescued 
band — sheep among wolves, and were, many of them, 
literally, pilgrims and strangers upon earth, cast out of 
the bosom of the state, and driven from the social circle ; 
while, as yet, those unlocked for and inexplicable events 
had not taken place which have so much staggered the 
faith of later Christians; while the near coming of their 
Lord was firmly expected, and while nothing had hap- 
pened of which he had not given his people an intima- 
tion; then, and during that fresh morning hour of the 
church, there belonged to the followers of Christ, gene- 
rally, a fulness of faith in the realities of the unseen 
world, such as, in later ages, has been reached only by 
a very few eminent and meditative individuals; the thou- 
sand then felt a persuasion which now is felt only by 
the two or three. In later and analogous seasons of per- 
secution, if there may have been a similar confidence in 
the bosoms of the many, it has been disturbed by some 
mixed seniiments. Questions of doctrine or points of 
ecclesiastical right, have ruffled, at least, the spirits, or 
soured the temper of the suflering party. But the tirst 
persecutions were the manifested rage of Satan and of 
his ministers, against Ciirist and his pe()])le. Later per- 
secutions have been, in some degree, struggles of parlies, 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 71 

alternately ascendant, and both claiming to act for Christ. 
Nero, Domitian, Galerius, Diocletian, acted in their pro- 
per guise; but Ximenes, Ferdinand, Mary, Bonner, 
glozed their atrocities under colour of evangelic zeal, and, 
perhaps even the arrogance of their pretensions, and 
their sophistry, abated the comfort and courage of many 
a martyr. 

Those who, in terror of Rome, and her lying tradi- 
tions, may wish to lay the axe, as they think, to the 
root of the tree, and to disclaim, in every sense, and to 
renounce dependence upon, and appeal to, those extra 
canonical documents of Christianity which have come 
down to us from the early and apostolic churches, may 
make the attempt, if they please, but they must soon 
find themselves standing upon ground on which still 
greater difficulties than those they run from, are in their 
way. We cannot, if we would, cut ourselves off from 
the benefits which the singular providence of God has 
secured for later times, in the preservation of the various 
memorials of the early and intervening ages. On this 
point I very forcibly feel that the inconsiderate and 
sweeping measures which some would recommend, 
must, if adopted, leave us our work to do over again, 
not only in the present argument, but in our controversy 
with popery. I cannot, therefore, advance without en- 
deavouring to make good my footing on this particular 
spot. 

All mystification apart, as well as a superstitious and 
overweening deference to antiquity, nothing can be more 
simple than the facts on which rests the legitimate use 
and value of the ancient documents of Christianity, con- 
sidered as the repositories of those practices and opi- 
nions which, obscurely or ambiguously alluded to in the 
canonical writings, are found, drawn forth and illustrated, 



72 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

in the records of Ihe times immediately succeeding. 
These records contain at once a testimony in behalf of 
the capital articles of our faith, and an exposition of 
minor sentiments and ecclesiastical usaores, neither of 
which can be surrendered without some serious loss and 
damage. 

How plain is the case before us (putting now aside 
the momentous testimony of the martyr church in behalf 
of fundamental truths.) , It must be admitted that all 
things are not amply and indubitably laid down in the 
apostolic writings; and, in a few instances, this indeter- 
minateness, or inconclusiveness of the canonical books, 
affects particulars in which \ve fain must make a practi- 
cal choice, and must adopt either one course or its op- 
posite. Now, what had in fact been done, or recom- 
mended, or allowed by the apostles, in the churches they 
personally founded, or governed, could not but be tho- 
roughly known in those churches during the lapse of a 
generation or two ; say, at the least, forty years. But 
we possess the various writings of the men of the ap- 
proximate generation, and therein find, as is natural, di- 
versified statements, and innumerable allusions to prac- 
tices and to opinions universally admitted, as of apos- 
tolic origin. Let us sift this evidence as we may, and 
it demands, as we shall see, to be severely sifted; and 
let it be reduced to the smallest possible amount, yet 
there remains what no man in his senses can deny to be 
a mass of good historical evidence, touching such or 
such points of apostolic Christianity. Shall we, then, 
listen to this evidence, or, at the impulse of some inex- 
plicable qualm, resolve not to hear a word of it? Or, 
are we, in fact, so destitute of historical acumen, as to 
render it a hopeless task to discern between the genuine 
and the spurious, in this body of materials ? And so, in 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 73 

matters of exposition, hov/ lightly soever we may esteem 
the judgment of the ancient commentators, they pos- 
sessed, at the least, (or many of them) a vernacular fa- 
miliarity with the canonical phraseology, to which it is 
arrogant and absurd not to pay a respectful attention. 
Shall the men of eighteen hundred years hence — the 
critics and professors of tlie universities of Australia and 
New Zealand — pretend to understand the language and 
idioms of the divines of the seventeenth century far bet- 
ter than we do, of the nineteenth? 

We may, and undoubtedly do, possess a critical ap- 
paratus such as gives us, in certain respects, an advan- 
tage over even Origen, Jerome, Basil, Theodoret, and 
Chrysostom; nevertheless they, as actually speaking 
and writing, or as being familiar with, the language of 
the New Testament, surely possessed prerogatives that 
can never be reasonably denied, any more than snatched 
from them. Origen may have been wrong in a hundred 
instances, or in more; but he read the gospels and 
epistles so as we can never do, with the fresh familiarity, 
and the idiomatic contact proper to the perusal of writings 
in one's own language, and less than two hundred years 
old; that is to say, precisely as we are now reading Til- 
lotson, Jeremy Taylor, Barrow, and Baxter. The mo- 
dern spirit of self-sufficiency, seems to me to reach its 
climax in the affected contempt thrown upon those who, 
endowed with as much learning and acumen as our- 
selves, read the scriptures while the ink of the apostolic 
autographs had hardly faded. 

To the early church also belongs the signal and una- 
lienable advantage of having expressed its sense of Chris- 
tian principles, previously to those perturbations of the 
spiritual atmosphere that arose from the great contro- 



74 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

versies of the fourth century, and which left nothing al- 
together in its unsophisticated condition. Whatever of 
precision or explicitness in doctrine might be the fruit of 
those controversies, there still attaches, as their charac- 
teristic, to the pristine writers, a plain and unimpaired 
straight-forwardness, which has its peculiar charm, as 
well as value. Less logical, we grant, and less theolo- 
gical, and less acute, and less subtle, and sometimes, as 
I shall liave occasion to show, involved in worse errors, 
the earlier writers are more calm and more refreshing 
than the later, and sooner win our affection, if they do 
not (which is certain] secure our confidence. 

There is, however, a still closer dealing with the uses 
and claim.s of the early Christian literature, to which the 
controversies moved by the Oxford writers make it ne- 
cessary accurately to attend; and, in fact, it has already 
become, or must soon become, a duty, in no way to be 
evaded by the leaders of opinion among the ministers of 
religion, so to apply their minds to this subject as to at- 
tain a well defined and permanent conviction, such as 
may guide their decisions on trying occasions, which 
are not very unlikely to arise. 

Let us, then, first state the case of those who, taking 
up the (modern) protestant pass-word, in its utmost ex- 
tent of meaning — " The Bible and the Bible alone " — 
would fain cut themselves off from all connexion witli 
every intermediate record, as well as with every remote 
community of Christians. ** If I have the word of God 
itself in my hands, which is able to make me, and all, 
wise unto salvation, what is antiquity to me?" — thus 
speak many; but with how much reason, remains to be 
inquired. 

If it did not frequently happen that vague impressions, 
the grounds of which have never been examined, are 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 75 

allowed to exert an influence, not only over the un- 
thinking and the uninformed, but over the educated and 
the intelligent, there could be no need to dwell for a 
moment upon a point which, like the one now before 
us, barely admits of what deserves to be called argu- 
ment. And yet, even if I might otherwise think myself 
excused from the seemingly needless task of making 
good my path in this instance, the peculiar character of 
the controversy before us would render it proper to do 
50. Every thing turns upon the clearness and sound- 
ness of the rule which is to be established in regard to 
the extent of the deference due, by the modern church, 
to the ancient church ; and nothing would be so certainly 
fatal to the principle we hope to substantiate, as to un- 
derrate that deference, in any such way as must leave 
our position liable to just and important exceptions. 

With all the brevity possible I will propound the case, 
which, in fact, has often been appealed to; and will do 
so in the convenient form of question and rejoinder, the 
interrogatories being put by a supposed protestant advo- 
cate of antiquity, to one whose protestantism appears to 
be somewhat extreme, or inconsiderate: as thus: — 

" We possess, by the divine favour, the word of God, 
able, as we both allow, and able by itself^ that is to say, 
apart from, and independently of, any other writings or 
traditions, to make men wise unto salvation : but I have 
two questions to put, and first, whence, proximately, did 
you receive this inestimable gift?" 

" From those who, before me, by the same divine 
goodness, had possessed and loved it: and, of course, 
they, in like manner, from their predecessors in the faith 
and hope of the gospel; and so from the first." 

" The Bible, then, is not sent to us, individually, from 
heaven; but has been consigned, like all other books, 



76 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

nay, on tlie very same conditions as profane literature^ 
to the hands of successive generations ; that is to say, it 
has been transmitted from fathers to sons, and is, itself, 
in this sense, a tradition: and, fully agreed, as doubt- 
less we are, as to the mere facts of the mode and cir- 
cumstances of this continuous delivery of the scriptures, 
we may well unite, first, in gratitude to God, whose pro- 
vidence has so watched over his written word, as that it 
has not merely been conserved, through long periods of 
confusion and ignorance, but has come down to us purer, 
and more copiously verified, as to the integrity of the 
text, than any other collection of ancient writings; but 
we may, also, as I presume, unite in a grateful and af- 
fectionate sentiment toward those to whose industry, 
from age to age, and to whose constancy and courage, at 
particular seasons, we are immediately indebted for the 
preservation of the inspired volume. Thus far you will 
admit, with me, the obligation of the modern church to 
the ancient church?" 

"Assuredly: my feelings towards those who, from 
age to age, have thus kept and handed down the precious 
deposite, are precisely analogous to those of a poor be- 
liever upon whom a more opulent brother in Christ be- 
stows a Bible: he thanks the charitable donor; but he 
does not so misunderstand his obligation as to surrender 
a particle of his Christian liberty and conscience to his 
benefactor. Come to us whence it may, the word of 
God is absolutely independent of the medium of its 
transmission from age to age. The pearl of great price 
may have traversed some stormy seas, but it has actually 
reached our shores, and we have acquitted our obliga- 
tion towards those who, at the peril of their lives, have 
brought it, when we just thank them, and say good 
morrow." 



i 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH, 77 

" Thus far, then, there appears no ground of disa- 
greement between us. But I have now to put my second 
question ; and, well-informed as you are on all points of 
biblical criticism and of literary history, I shall be in no 
danger of shaking your religious convictions by pro- 
pounding my difficulty. On what ground, then, do you 
receive the Bible, collectively, or its prophets, histories, 
gospels, and epistles, severally, as indeed the word of 
God? The inspired pages do not shine out with any 
supernatural splendour, nor do the writers always affirm 
their own canonicity; or even if they do, there are spu- 
rious writings that contain equivalent asseverations of 
divine, authority, to wit, the Clementine Constitutions, 
and many others, as you need not be told. Or if we 
think of the collection, as a whole, it is no where made 
up, and catalogued, within the book itself. Now, I will 
anticipate all that part of your reply to my question 
"which must refer to the customary, and, as I grant, un- 
impeachable internal evidences of the genuineness of the 
books of scripture, severally, and concerning which we 
should have no difference of opinion. The whole of 
that critical history of scripture, by which it is proved, 
beyond possibility of doubt, (concerning most of the 
books,) that, in the ordinary sense of the phrase, they 
are genuine, is known to both of us, and is assented to 
by both; and it is farther admitted, in common, that the 
proof of the antiquity and genuineness of the books of 
the canon involves, by a sound historical and logical in- 
ference, their divine authority, or inspiration, leaving us 
in no doubt whether or not they exhibit the will of the 
Lord, to which we owe absolute and implicit submis- 
sion, in faith and practice. 

*' But now, before I reach my ultimate position, I re- 
quest you not altogether to overlook the incidental, and 



78 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

yet ineffably important service that has been rendered to 
the modern church by the ancient church, or, let us say, 
the long series of Christian writers, who, in their copi- 
ous, and, for the most part, exact quotations of scrip- 
ture, and by their reverent manner of appealing to it, 
have afforded the amplest means, first, of tracking the 
very text of scripture, whole and entire, up from age to 
age, as the very same text (various readings allowed for) 
which we now read, and so as to exempt us from- all 
reasonable anxiety concerning this text; and, secondly, 
of ascertaining particular readings^ with a degree of 
assurance which, otherwise, would not have been at- 
tainable. See, then, as well the extent of our obliga- 
tions to our Christian predecessors, as the intimacy, and 
the incalculable importance of that constant correspon- 
dence which the church must hold with the extant re- 
mains of Christian literature. Will you look at the 
facts of the case, and then dare to say, as some do, ' I 
hold the Bible, and I care nothing for antiquity : the fa- 
thers ! let them fall, one and all, into the hands of ano- 
ther Omar.' Does your protestantism go to this length ?" 

•— '' Need you ask it ? Who that is ever so moderately 
informed in such matters can deny, or can wish to dis- 
parage the critical use of the Greek and Latin Church 
writers ? The aids they afford are, I grant, of inesti- 
mable value ; but 1 can allow^ all this, and yet hold them, 
one and all, very cheap as authorities in doctrine, or as 
expounders of scripture, or as examples in practice; and 
you do not forget that, in the sense of which we are now 
speaking, an heretical father serves us, to the full, as 
good a turn as an orthodox one, and that the schismatic 
Novatian is as available an authority for establishing a 
reading, as the orthodox Athanasius." 

— *' This admission does not appear to touch the point 



tJPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH, 79 

in debate ; but would it not sorely grieve many a stanch 
protestant to hear you attribute so much importance, 
even as this, to those whom they have heen taught to 
think of only as the parents and abettors of popery? 
They would insinuate, I think, that it might be well to 
look out for some more thorough-going champion of the 
good cause. Let this, however, pass: you divine what 
I next intend. After we have allowed all the force that 
can be claimed for it, to that method of proof which, 
looking solely to the text of an ancient autlior, as it is 
in itself, and to the literary history of the book, esta- 
blishes its genuineness, will you affirm that we want 
nothing more in deciding the all-important questions that 
arise concerning a particular book, or epistle, whether 
it be canonical and a part of God's word or not? Let 
us assume the instance of the second epistle of Peter. 
The antiquity of the writing is, to a certain point, clearly 
ascertained, and, moreover, a nice examination of its 
style and recondite peculiarities, well supports the belief 
that it is what it professes to be ; and that it may safely 
be appealed to in support of doctrines and duties. But 
is the argument in this particular instance concluded, or 
is there no other consideration which ought herein to be 
regarded ?" 

— "I know what you intend; but rather than make 
my answer at this point, I request you to state your in- 
tention fully. I will tlien reply so far as may be neces- 
sary to save my protestant principle." 

— "I affirm then plainly, 'J'hat, v/hatever sufficiency 
and completeness we may attribute to the critical proof 
of the genuineness and integrity of the text of the seve- 
ral books of scripture, there is yet a link in the chain of 
argument wanting, and this link is supplied by nothing 



80 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

else but the judgment and the testimony of the ancient 
church, concerning these books, individually, that they, 
and not others, (although sustained by specious preten- 
sions,) were the productions of the apostles, and had 
been, fronn the first, so received and reverenced. I say, 
in deciding the question of genuineness or spuriousness, 
or in discriminating, for instance, between the gospel of 
John, and the acts of Peter, or in distinguishing among 
genuine writings, the inspired from the uninspired ; the 
epistles of Paul from those of Clement, Polycarp, and 
Ignatius; we are thrown upon the judgment and autho- 
rity of the early church. Notwithstanding all tlie ex- 
ceptions that have been urged against this averment, 
when advanced, as it so often has been, by the advocates 
of tradition, and notwithstanding the ill use which has 
been made of tlie instance, I must profess to think that 
the plain fact carries with it an unquestionable and im- 
portant inference to this effect, namely. That, by the 
mode chosen for consigning the sacred writings to after- 
times, the divine providence has connected the later with 
the earlier church, by a link which can never be severed, 
and which connexion implies a general duty of ac- 
quainting ourselves with the records of the early church, 
and of yielding such a specific deference to its testimo- 
ny and judgment, as is not to be claimed for the church 
of any later period. Bring the principle to a test in the 
instance, already named, of the second epistle of Peter: 
a critical examination of the two epistles affords what 
the best modern biblists have regarded as full and satis- 
factory evidence of the genuineness of the latter. But 
is there any one who, in order to give proof of his con- 
fidence in the sufficiency of this mode of argument, 
would refuse to search for references to the epistle, in 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 81 

the early writers ? None would do so ; on the contra- 
ry, it is with a lively pleasure that we find this episile 
quoted by Clement, Hermas, Justin, Athenagoras. This 
then is the second h.ead of argument, or kind of proof, 
available in the ease; and it is such as to leave no rea- 
sonable doubt concerning the fact of the existence of the 
epistle in the age of those writers, or of its reputed au- 
thenticity. But there is yet a third argument, proper to 
the subject, and this consists in that judgment of the 
whole case which was formed by the learned divines of 
the fourth century, who, notwithstanding the doubts en- 
tertained during an early intermediate period, reviewed 
the evidence, and admitted the epistle into the canon. Now 
not only do we assent to this decision as a sound one; 
but, even if we are not absolutely dependent upon it, 
for our own opinion, on so important an occasion, we 
are yet deeply indebted to those who thus anticipated the 
cri7zV«/ decision of modern scholars; for (let it be re- 
membered) had these divines otherwise determined, and 
had they actually excluded the epistle from the list of 
inspired writings, even if it had come down to us at all, 
the task would have been one of great difficulty and anx- 
ety, toiiave replaced it in the canon by mere force of cri- 
ticism. And it is very doubtful whether, so sustained, it 
would have won the assent of the church at large : a much 
more probable event would have been its resting to the end 
of time, under a ban, as apocryphal ; and thus would the 
church of all ages have been mulct of much edification, 
and moreover deprived of certain points of belief which 
rest exclusively upon affirmations contained in that 
epistle." 

"Be it so: but, without staying to contest the point 
with you, as to the relative or absolute importance that 

8 



82 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

attaches to this third branch of the argument, concern- 
ing the genuineness and canonicity of the books of 
scripture, I may easily grant to you the general utility 
of a reference to antiquity, on this single ground^ 
without compromising my great principle, the Bible 

alone." 

— '* Nay, you cannot grant so much as this, without, 
on the one hand, breaking in upon, and offending the 
self-sufficient presumption of a large and forward class 
of prolestants, and, on the other hand, implying all that 
I am now careful to secure, namely, a deference, as 
cautious and discriminating as you please, due by the 
modern church, to the ancient church. I affirm that the 
Lord himself, by that very arrangement which has 
thrown so much importance upon the testimony and 
JUDGMENT of the pastors and divines of the early ages^ 
in the matter of the discrimination of the inspired 
writings, has virtually constituted them, to a limited ex- 
tent, our masters ; or, at the least, has virtually forbidden 
the attempt to sever ourselves from them. Nevertheless^ 
and this I most readily grant you, there are urgent rea- 
sons, and more than enough, for exercising the utmost 
possible caution in yielding this due deference, in each 
single instance in which it may be challenged." 

But I must insist with some strenuousness upon the 
general inference I am wishing to derive from the plain 
fact of our dependence, in so momentous an instance, 
upon the judgment, fidelity, and discretion, of the pri- 
mitive church. Consequences, affecting every part of 
the present controversy, flow from the principle which 
this inference involves, and, as I think, it very clearly 
excludes the extreme opinions, as well of the upholders^ 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 83 

as of the impngners of the authority of antiquity. I 
very well know that indeterminate conclusions, such as 
the one now in view must be at the best, may easily be 
spurned by an opponent, as unworthy of his serious re- 
gard: be it so: I am not just now thinking of what a de- 
termined adversary, or rigorous disputant, may choose to 
allege ; but rather am offering considerations to one whom 
I suppose to be willing to listen to whatever may appear 
to deserve the regard of a religious mind ; whether or 
not it may be available in a formal and categorical argu- 
ment. 

Listen, then, to me with a little indulgence; and those 
need not listen at all who can afford none. All will agree 
that the settlement of the question of canonicity, or the 
divine authority of each book, alleged to bear this sacred 
character, is one of primary and unspeakable import- 
ance ; it is the preliminary of our faith and duty; nor 
can it be supposed that we attach more importance to the 
subject than is attached to it by the Lord himself, who 
will neither give his honour to another, nor lightly allow 
the honour belonging to his authentic word to be shared 
by spurious compositions. It is also clear that such a 
formal announcement of the canonical writings might 
have been given (as, for example, in an undoubted final 
epistle of the last surviving apostle,) as should altogether 
have superseded either any reference, on our part, to the 
judgment of the early church, or any exercise of that 
judgment. On the other side, it might so have been, 
that several apparently apostolic writings had descended 
from the apostolic age, having such internal recommen- 
dations as would have made the task of discrimination, 
in later times, hopelessly difficult ; in which case, we 
should have been thrown, without appeal, upon the de- 
cisions of antiquity. 



84 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

But neither of these things has happened to lis ; and 
instead of either, we find ourselves placed under aa 
economy, in this particular respect, which, in a very- 
significant manner, blends th-e conditions of dependence 
and independence. We cannot but refer to, and avail 
ourselves of, the judgment and iinal decision o^ the 
early church, concerning the canonicity of each portion 
of the New Testament; and yet this decision is not our 
only resource. Farthermore, the two lines of proof do 
(and in the opinion of the best modern scholars) so coin- 
cide, as wonderfully to authenticate each other. In each 
instance the literary, or internal evidence, is such as to 
win our approval of the judgment of antiquity; and 
again the judgment of antiquity has neither presented to 
us, finally, any book which the internal evidence disal- 
lows, nor has it pronounced against any extant book, 
which that evidence might have allowed. The result 
is — a rational and firm assurance, more or less entire in 
each instance, that the New Testament is constituted of, 
and includes, the divinely inspired apostolic writings. 

Thus then are we, and all believers to the end of time, 
connected with the pristine church, by an indissoluble 
and vital cord. Yet are we not bound to it servilely. 
Our relation is that of pupilage, not of bondage. We 
inherit as sons; we do not occupy as serfs; our highest 
interests have been at the disposal of our predecessors ; 
but have not been subjected to an unconditional despot- 
ism. We can no more shake off our dependence to the 
extent which it legitimately reaches, than the inheritor 
of an entail can dispose of his real estate as he may of 
his personals. In relation to this point, we are neither 
indulged with the liberty which the wilfulness of our 
nature so fondly seeks for ; nor are we so fettered as the 



trPON THE ANCIENt CHURCH. 85 

sullen advocates of despotism would wish: and, placed 
as we are, it is equally a fault to spurn authority, or to 
cringe before it. 

Now I must think that our position in this particular 
instance imbodies a general principle, applicable to most 
of the perplexing questions now agitated, or likely to be 
brought under discussion; and it is in this belief that I 
so much urge the consideration of it. In many of those 
cases in which the ambiguous, or incomplete language 
of the inspired writers, in incidentally alluding to points 
of discipline or faith, has given rise to schismatic diver- 
sities of opinion, we are (as in the question of the canon) 
by necessity thrown upon the testimony and judgment 
of the early church ; but yet are not thrown thereupon 
helplessly, or without opportunity of appeal to collateral 
arguments. Thus, in regard to the principle of the in- 
herited and transmitted clerical authority, there is a se- 
rious practical meaning in the principle ; nevertheless 
the existence of Christianity in the world, or in any par- 
ticular country, is by no means so involved in it as that, 
in the event of an accidental rupture of the chain of or- 
dination, there could be no more faith or holiness on the 
face of the earth, or in this or that region, until a new 
•investiture had been sent down from heaven, and mira- 
•culously attested. A single bible, thrown ashore from a 
wreck, might, as I will not doubt, become the seed of a 
true church, in the midst of a heretofore atheistic com- 
munity. Nevertheless such a new and extraordinary 
-germination of the tree of life would by no means inva- 
lidate the general doctrine (rationally held) of the minis- 
terial succession. A real dependence, but not a slavish, 
or abject, or hopeless dependence, is, as I think, the 
I. AW of the spiritual economy. 

8* 



86 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

But whatever demur may be raised against the alleged 
authority of the ancient church in matters of opinion, 
and in c'ases where the first Christians were as liable to 
error as ourselves, it is clearly impracticable to exclude 
their testimony as to mutters of fact ; and the operation 
of this testimony extends, I think, rather farther than 
some appear willing to admit. It is easy to find illus- 
trations, real and imaginary, of the deference which (all 
superstitious affection apart) common sense, and the 
universally admitted priiiciples of historical criticism, 
compel us to yield in such cases. 

Tiie epistles, for example, contain allusions, either 
very slight, or actually ambiguous, to many matters of 
usage, some of them altogether unimportant to ourselves, 
and^'others so connected with discipline, worship, govern- 
ment, or even doctrine, as to render it, to say tiie least, 
highly desirable to know just so much more as may serve 
to exclude controversy on the subject. INow, and as 
might have been expected, the very same points are 
either alluded to, or are explicitly defined by the Chris- 
tian writers of the next generation, or of the next age. 
It would have been strange indeed if it had not been 
so ; and equally strange, nay, utterly absurd, were it, if 
we were to refuse to avail ourselves of the aid of tins 
subsidiary evidence, so far as it may fairly be resorted 
to. Did Paul preach the gospel in these islands? a 
question of little or no importance to British Christians 
of the present times, and yet of some curiosity : and 
who is there that would not gladly gratify so natural a 
feelino-, if the means of doing so are at hand in the ex- 
tant written traditions of the early cliurch ? Did Peter 
preach the gospel at Rome; or, if so, did he found and 
govern the church there? a question this which has hap- 



UPON THE AXCIENT CHURCH. 87 

pened to become important, and which we must take the 
same means, if they be within our reach, for determining. 

Now either in the one instance, or the other, nothing 
can be less pertinent than the preclusive, ultra-protestant 
outcry — '* Oh, the Bible, and the Bible alone ; I care 
nothing for what cannot be proved by texts of scripture." 
We may easily find occasions more fit, in which our 
zeal for the honour and sufficiency of the inspired volume 
may make itself heard. The question is a question of 
fact; and as such, it is open to all those various methods 
of proof, or of disproof, which are ordinarily had re- 
course to in historical inquiries. It might reasonably 
have been thought that not a word could have been 
needed in making good so simple and obvious a rule of 
proceeding. 

Other instances, variously affected by this same rule, 
or coming within its application in different degrees, 
have a hundred times, and especially of late, been ad- 
duced ; and some of these will present themselves, which 
demand all the caution, the acumen, and the diligence 
that can be brought to bear upon them. They are, how- 
ever, all governed by a general practical principle, not 
very difficult to be established or applied (although con- 
tested by certain parties) and it is this first, That no arti- 
cle of worship, discipline, government, or opinion, which, 
however well attested as belono^in^ even to the apostolic 
churches of the first century, is no where alluded to, or 
enjoined, in the inspired scriptures, can be binding 
upon the church in after-times ; for we adhere to the 
belief, and on this very ground renounce Romanism, 
that, whatever our Lord intended to be of permanent 
observance in his church, he has caused to be included 
in the canonical writings: and, secondly, that points so 



88 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

attested as ancient, and yet very slightly or ambiguously 
alluded to by the inspired writers, are not to be regarded 
as of prime necessity, or insisted upon as conditions of 
communion. The reason of \he first part of our gene- 
ral principle carries with it this second; for we may re- 
ligiously believe that all points, at once of great moment, 
and of universal application, are so affirmed in scripture 
as to carry the convictions of every humble and docile 
mind. 

T sliall have occasion, once and again, in the following 
pages, to quote that favourite of the Romanists, and, as 
it seems, of the Oxford Tract writers, Vincent of Lerins, 
and therefore will not cite him here, on a merely inci- 
dental point; otherwise it would be easy to obtain his 
explicit sanction to both parts of the rule now stated. 
In truth, I would not scruple to refer the controversy, as 
to its principles, between the church of Rome, and our- 
selves, to the sole arbitration of this very writer. How 
can Romanists dare appeal to him, except on the pre- 
sumption that their opponents will never know more of 
him than is contained in the passages ihey may please 
to adduce ? I would even venture to argue the present 
questions before the same arbiter, and abide by his deci- 
sion, fairly taken. But to return. — 

An instance often adduced in this connexion, is that 
of the 'religious observance of the first day of the week, 
whicli, after we have Ibund it clearly, though not copi- 
ously alluded to by the inspired writers, as the practice 
of the first Christians, is sufficiently proved, by subse- 
qlient testimonies, to have been so observed by those 
who immediately succeeded them. It is (not to mention 
here the more general grounds of argument) a well 
CONFIRMED TUADiTioN, taking its rise in the apostolic 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 89 

writings, and thence onward supported by unquestion- 
able evidence. Those must create a difficulty, who find 
any in this instance, in distinguishing between a proper 
and necessary appeal to antiquity, and an unwarrantable 
and dang^erous deference to it. The religious reason 
for observing tlie Lord's day is, that the apostles them- 
selves, as we fully believe, observed it, and sanctioned 
its observance in all the churches which they founded. 
The historic reason for believing that they did so, is 
drawn partly from the two or three allusions to this ob- 
«ervanc<j in the New Testament; and partly, we might 
say chiefly, from the incidental and the explicit mention 
of the observance by the early Christian writers, as well 
as by Pliny, Plutarch, and others. 

If we imagine ourselves entirely deprived of this lat- 
ter portion of the evidence on this point, it must be ad- 
mitted that the argument in support of an institution so 
vitally connected, as it is found to be, with the very ex- 
istence of religion in the world, would be reduced to a 
slender and precarious inference, or argument from ana- 
logy. Here then we are absolutely compelled, and those 
especially who are rigid more than others in their regard 
to the Lord's day, are compelled to resort to the aid of 
ancient usage, as recorded, not by the inspired, but by 
uninspired writers: and we may well appeal to the can- 
dour of such persons, and ask them, whether, when con- 
tending with lalitudinarians, on this important subject, 
they would not eagerly avail themselves of any new, and 
still more explicit testimony concerning the usage of the 
churches in the apostolic age, supposing some such evi- 
dence, heretofore overlooked, were now suddenly to be 
discovered. I presume that they would do so, w^ithout 
allowing any qualm, as to *' the great protestant princi- 
ple," to stand in their way. It is in fact a circumstance 



90 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

worthy to be noticed, that even the most ultra-protestant 
of ultra-protestapils, if it happens to him to meet with a 
real or apparent confirmation of his peculiar views, with- 
in the circle of ecclesiastical antiquity, shows no reluc- 
tance whatever in snatching at it, and in turning it to the 
best account he can, piously quoting Irenaeus, or Tertul- 
lian, or Ignatius, like any good Romanist! It is — " the 
Bible, and the Bible alone," just when the evidence af- 
forded, on some disputed point, by the writings of Ig- 
natius, or Irenaeus, or Tertullian, happens to tell in the 
wrong direction; otherwise, these " papistical authori- 
ties " are good enough. 

The two cases then that have here been adduced, (and 
I have purposely avoided such as involve controversy) 
seem, as I think, to establish, beyond a doubt, all that I 
am concerned for at present; and which, expressed as 
broadly and inoffensively as possible, amounts to this 
general principle — That it is as impracticable, as it would 
be undesirable, and even irreligious, to detach ourselves 
from all dependence upon Christian antiquity; and that, 
as in the capital and foremost article of the antiquity, 
and canonicity, and genuineness, of the books of scrip- 
ture, so in various matters of discipline, worship, go- 
vernment, and doctrine, nothing else can be done by the 
modern church, but listen (with just so much deference 
as may be due) to the testimony and judgment of the 
ancient church. 

There may indeed be those who would freely avail 
themselves of the evidence of antiquity in relation to 
matters of fact, while they would be extremely jealous 
of it, or totally exclude it, in relation to matters of opi- 
nion. Now granting that tlie distinction between facts 
and opinions, or doctrines, may be real, and pertinent 
too, in the present case, yet surely no one can forget 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 91 

that pure matters of opinion, or doctrines, become, to 
all intents, matters of fact, whenever they attach to large 
bodies of men, or communities, for a length of time, 
and are customarily professed, and perpetually repeated. 
The Mahometan doctrines of the unity of God, and of 
the pleasures of paradise, are not at all less matters of 
fact, than are the conquest of Syria, or of Egypt, by the 
caliphs. And thus it is that the faith of the ancient 
church may be ascertained, as a matter of fact, not less 
easily, or less certainly, than its sufferings, or its modes 
of government, or its spread, in this or that country. 

Nor is the ascertaining of such facts, whether of 
usage, or of doctrine, so perplexing, or so ambiguous 
as might be imagined; for as Christianity, instead of its 
having been cooped up in Judea, during two or three 
generations, instantly pervaded all the countries around 
the Mediterranean, every one of its most conspici:ous 
elements was laid open to the observation and report of 
unconnected witnesses, so as to exclude, not merely col- 
lusion in regard to the facts so reported, but in regard to 
the preparation of the evidence which has come down 
to us. In the most unexceptionable modes of proof, we 
may know what was the religious system of the Chris- 
tian societies of the second century, throughout the coun- 
tries between the Euphrates and the Atlantic, and be- 
tween the deserts of Lybia and the Danube. 

The principle, above stated, (in whatever terms we 
may choose to imbody it) while it consists with the ge- 
neral laws of the social system, and is in harmony with 
the conditions on which all advancement in knowled^re 
depends, plainly and unavoidably results from that pe- 
culiar economy under which the Lord himself has placed 
the gospel dispensation. He has not allowed his peo- 
ple, in any age, the undesirable liberty of cutting them- 



92 THE DEPENDENCE OF THE MODERN CHURCH 

selves off from all dependence upon their predecessors.^ 
any more than he has left them free so to act, as if their 
conduct, as Christians, would not have an influence over 
the religious well-being of their successors. The church 
is one church, stretchinfj throuo^hout the atJ^es that are to 
elapse betwee»n the first, and the second advent. 

But now this dependence of the modern church upon 
the ancient Church, has, in fact, been misunderstood^ 
and abused, in an extreme degree; and, moreover, it in- 
volves some real and serious difficulties in all occasions 
of controversy. What tlien remains to be done? Not 
to cut the knot by renouncing the dependence: — tliis we 
are not free to do; but, and there is no alternative, we 
are summoned to exercise, although at the cost of pain- 
ful labours, a necessary discrimination, by the aid of 
which we may avail ourselves, without abusing it, of the 
TESTIMONY and JUDGMENT of the ancient church. Some 
may indeed resent this alleged necessity, and may have 
recourse to various expedients to evade it; but their 
struggles will be to no purpose in regard to the cause 
they wish to serve; while there will be not wanting some, 
quick to perceive, and prompt to turn to their advantage,, 
the argumentative boon, thus unwisely surrendered to 
them. It has been nothing so much as this inconside- 
rate "Bible alone " outcry, that has given modern popery 
so long a reprieve in the heart of protestant countries; 
and it is now the very same zeal, without discretion, 
that opens a fair field for the spread of the doctrines of 
the Oxl'^ord Tracts. 

I venture, then, not witliout diffidence, and yet with 
a calm confidence in the soundness of the course I am 
pursuing, to invite those wlio already feci the moment 
of the controversy set on foot by the writers of those 
tracts, and who perceive the double consequence which 



UPON THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 93 

it carries, to enter upon snch researches, in the field of 
Christian antiquity, as may be found requisite, whether 
more or less laborious, for obtaining a well-defined con- 
viction as to the extent and conditions of the deference 
that is due to the practices and opinions of the early 
church. May lie who giveth liberally, and without 
upbraiding, as well wisdom as strength, to those who 
are conscious that both must be given from above, gra- 
ciously, in this instance, aid our endeavours ! 



A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 
OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 

So far as we may have in view the usurpations and 
the lying pretensions of Rome, nothing can be clearer 
than the course to be pursued by protestants. Such and 
such practices, or opinions, and in which popery con- 
sists, may be proved to be of such or such a date; they 
are, therefore, not apostolic; they are not catholic; they 
are not even ancient, any more than they are scriptural: 
why, then, should we receive and submit to them? " I 
am catholic, not you," may every protestant say to every 
Romanist, and with as full an assurance as that with 
which the genuine Cambrian may say to the Fitzwil- 
liams, the Walters, the Villiers, the Godfreys, " I am 
British, not you ; I had turned this soil ages before you 
Normans had set a foot on the island." We are not 
compelled, by any logical or argumentative obligation, 

9 



94 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

to do more than passively to reject, and resolutely to re- 
sist, Romanism, that is to say, the false, debauched, and 
tyrannous superstition of the middle ages. Protestant- 
ism, as opposed to popery, is a refusal to accept innova- 
tions, bearing an ascertained date. 

Or, we might confine our protest against popery within 
the pithy denunciations of the Romanists' own saint, 
Vincent of Lerins — Annuntiare ergo aliquid Christianis 
eatholicis, praeter id, quod acceperunt, nunquam licuit'^ 
nusquam licet, nunquam licebit; et anathematizare eos, 
qui annunciant aliquid, praeterquam quod semel acceptum 
est, nunquam non oportuit, nusquam non oportet, nun- 
quam non oportebit. 

But, after thus remanding popery until it can show 
some cause why it should, for a moment, be listened tOj, 
serious difficulties meet us in our upward course toward 
apostoiic Christianity; nor does there appear to be any 
summary process by which these difficulties may be 
surmounted. By the determined opponents of antiquity 
they will be stated in terms so strong as must, if we. 
listen to them, lead to the conclusion tiiey desire, name- 
ly, an utter rejection of whatever comes to us through 
the contaminated channels of ecclesiastical tradition. 
Such a one will not fail briskly to put the question — . 
''Why draw a line, where there is no important dis- 
tinction, between the religion of the tenth century and 
that of the ninth, or of the eighth, or of the seventh?" 
or he will demand that we should show that Christianity 
was in a much purer state in the sixth century than in 
the seventh ; or that it had not become vitally corrupted 
even in the fifth ; or that, in the fourth, it retained its es- 
sential purity : and if these questions, put in broad terms, 
are pushed on toward the earliest years to which our ex- 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 95 

tant materials extend, a real perplexity will attach to the 
answer that is to be given to them : in truth, we shall 
never be able to deal with the subject in the abstract, or 
in mass ; for it means nothing, or nothing as to any prac- 
tical bearing, either to say, vaguely, the ancient church 
was in error; or, as vaguely, to deny such a charge. 
We must descend to the particulars, and must sift the 
evidence with a minute and impartial scrupulosity, and 
the result, which we may confidently anticipate, is pre- 
cisely what a true knowledge of human nature, sup- 
ported by the evidence of all history, would lead any 
cairn and philosophic mind to expect, namely, that, 
while the testimony of the pristine church, concerning 
certain facts and doctrines, remains unimpeached, and is 
in the highest degree important, and while its faith, its 
constancy, its courage, its charity, its heavenly-minded- 
ness, are the objects of just admiration and imitation, it 
had admitted certain specific errors, and had yielded 
itself to some natural but pernicious impressions, which 
make a blind obsequiousness toward it, on our part, 
equally dangerous and absurd. There is, surely, no 
mystery in all this, nor any miracle; but simply what is 
in analogy with the uniform course of human affairs, 
even when benefited by the intervention of heavenly in- 
fluences. Either to worship the pristine church, or to 
condemn it, in the mass, would be just as unwise as to 
treat the church of our own times, or of any other times, 
in a manner equally undiscriminating. But, although 
there be neither miracle nor mystery in the facts which 
an impartial research brings to light, concerning the re- 
ligious and moral condition of our Christian predeces- 
sors of the early ages, how much of mystification has 
darkened the minds of many, in their notions of anti- 



96 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

qiiity, and how much of what must have been, had it 
had place, really miraculous, has virtually and silently 
been attributed to the course of events, m the church, 
from the death of the apostles, to the time when it ceases 
to be any longer practicable even to imagine any such 
supernatural control of ecclesiastical affairs! 

In truth, there have been, and are, many (and as it 
seems, some of those that embrace the opinions of the 
Oxford writers are of the number) who, while they might 
perhaps deny the claim of the martyr church to the pos- 
session of miraculous powers, and disallow the entire 
series of legends, of the healing the sick, and raising the 
dead, yet cling to the fond belief that the church, during 
the early centuries, was favoured by some more imme- 
diate divine superintendence than is the church of our 
own times; or, in a word, that a species of theocracy, 
with its Urim and Thummim, and its Shekinah, had an 
existence — vigorous at the first, and gradually fading and 
melting away, into the merely human hierarchical econo- 
my of the papacy, A vague notion, such as this, may 
indeed appear to be sanctioned by certain of our Lord's 
expressions; but those who entertain it should not forget 
tliat, unless those expressions were intended to be limit- 
ed to the apostles and first teachers, they are undoubt- 
edly the property of the church in all ages, and without 
any privilege in behalf of the early ages. And then it 
will follow that they confer no claim to deference, or 
general authority, for the ancient church, than what be- 
longs to the modern; and thence also it follows that, if 
we actually find, within the precincts of the modern 
church, strange and unsightly combinations of high and 
sacred truths, and solid virtues, with preposterous errors, 
and sad delinquencies, so may it have been, and so was 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 97 

it, in an equal, and, as I think, in even a greater degree, 
within the enclosure of the ancient church. 

I do not wish, in the present argument, to employ at 
all the phrases — philosophical temper, or philosophical 
views, lest 1 should be so far misunderstood, or misre- 
presented, as to be supposed to favour that modern guise 
of infidelity, called rationalism. Instead, therefore, in 
the present instance, of saying we should learn to look 
at the history of the primitive church with a philosophic 
^eye, I will urge the necessity of regarding the dim ob- 
jects of those remote times, with the cool and piercing 
perceptions of an undamaged eye; or, in other words, 
tinder the guidance of plain good sense, which, amid all 
kinds of illusive appearances, adheres to the constant 
principle, that human nature, however much it may have 
been raised above its ordinary level in particular instances, 
has always quickly subsided, and been substantially 
the same, in every age, and country. There never yet 
has been, on earth, a community of angels: there have 
been saints; that is to say, men, in the main, good and 
wise; but there has been no corporation or entire band of 
saints, any more than any faultless individuals. Or if it 
were allowed, which I think it must be, that some pe- 
riods have very far excelled others in piety and wisdom, 
I should still demur to the allegation that the era imme- 
diately following the death of the apostles can claim any 
such pre-eminence. Nay, I am compelled lo say, that 
the general impression, made upon my mind by the ac- 
tual evidence, is altogether of a contrary kind. 

On this subject, however, important on so many ac- 
counts, as nothing but the plain and simple truth, so far 
as attainable, can render us any real service, or be ac- 
cepted by any sound mind; so, any thing else than the 

9* 



98 , A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

simple truth, will not fail to exaggerate, or to pervert our 
notions upon most religious subjects; and while enter- 
taining any such illusions, our alternatives will be a ser- 
vile superstition, or sheer infidelity. 

It does not appear that we have as yet, on any side, 
obtained, a full, clear, and matter-of-fact idea of the moral 
and religious condition of the ancient church; and I am 
strongly inclined to believe that, w^hoever may be suc- 
cessful in eliciting such an idea, and in giving it clearly 
to the church at large, will, in so doing merely, have 
gone far toward effecting the silent and final disappear- 
ance of many inveterate errors. Nay, I believe that it will 
be on this side that the fibres of popery itself, will be 
severed, and so the horrid excrescence disengaged from 
the religious convictions of the civilized world. 

So great a w^ork (yet in itself simple, although vast in 
its consequences) will not be effected by a single hand: 
indeed, the mere thought that this were possible, w^ould 
oppress the mind thai should address itself to the task. 
Meaning no more then, than to do my part, however 
small, I shall attempt, in this line, what the occasion 
seems to demand. And in doing so, instead of carrying 
forward a multifarious inquiry, concerning twenty topics 
of early opinion and practice, I shall select, in this first 
instance, and confine myself to a particular topic, and 
shall clear a path, as I go, right onward toward tlie high- 
est antiquity. But then tins selected subject of inquiry 
must be one, not of an incidental, but of an intrinsically 
important kind; and it must have intimate alliances with 
the entire ecclesiastical and religious system of antiquity, 
and it must, from its peculiar character, be well adapted 
to the general purpose of bringing, vividly and distinctly, 
into view, the general, and the special merits and faults 
of the times in question. 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 99 

Such a subject, recommending itself to our choice, 
with singular completeness, by its conformity with the 
above-named conditions, is found in the ancient, and the 
universal opinion entertained in the Christian Church, 
concerning the merits, and the spiritual eflicacy of celi- 
bacy, and especially of uncontaminated virginity; taken 
in connexion with the practices thence immediately re- 
sulting, and the sanctioned institutions to which, in an 
early age, it gave rise. With what belongs to Romanism, 
we have nothing now to do: — nothing with the compul- 
sory celibacy of the clergy, nothing with the penal rigours 
of the monastic vow; nothing with the corruptions, or the 
horrors, engendered by this system when its proper influ- 
ence had come to take effect upon the European com- 
monwealth. These things we altogether remit, or only 
glance at them in passing, and direct our vigilant regards 
to the very same system in its young days, and before 
it had rendered itself execrable; and while it was yet 
recommended by lofty virtues, and by some substantial 
fruits, as well as excused by many subsidiary reasons. 
"What we have to do with, touches — the view taken by 
the church, of Christianity, as a moral economy, or ethi- 
cal system, from the very earliest times; it touches too 
the principles whence sprang the most ancient notions 
concerning the mysterious properties of the sacraments; 
it touches intimately the position and the power of the 
clergy; it touches the fundamental doctrines of justifica- 
tion, and sanctification; in a word, it leaves nothing in 
the theological, or the ecclesiastical system, of ancient 
Christianity, untouched. I offer no apology then, for 
the choice I have made in the present instance; for the 
momentous controversy now before the church justifies 
any means clearly tending to bring it to a determinate 
issue, which a religious writer can wish to resort to. 



100 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

Let it be enough that I pledge myself to respect every 
pure and manly feeling which should belong to one who is 
himself a husband and a father. Very much that pro- 
perly belongs to the subject, and which, if adduced, 
would powerfully sustain the inference I have in view, 
can neither be brought forward, nor even alluded to. I 
shall cite just so much as is indispensable, in regard to 
the important conclusion toward which we are tending. 
And at the outset I must profess my serious and delibe*- 
rate belief that no other element of ancient Christianity 
so well, as the one which I have chosen, would subserve 
the'purposes of the general argument, or tend so directly 
to open the way for terminating the controversy which 
now divides the church. 

But a nice question presents itself on the threshold, 
which perhaps I am barely entitled to put to the writers 
of the Tracts for the Times, and it is this — Why they have 
hitherto avoided, so scrupulously, a subject which, as they 
very well know, stands forward as the most prominent 
characteristic of ancient Christianity? These learned 
persons do not need to be told that, whenever we turn 
our eyes toward the dim distance of the pristine ages, 
there is one glaring spot, the glitter of which dazzles the 
sight; and that this luminous point of the piety of the 
early church, is — the celestial, or angelic excellence of 
virginity. They well know that this opinion, and con- 
comitant practice, was no accident of the system; but 
its very nucleus, the emanating centre of feeling and be- 
haviour; and that, even putting out of view the extrava- 
gances of individuals, this opinion comes down to us 
sanctioned by the authority of all the most illustrious 
doctors and confessors — the entire catena patrum. They 
well know that this at least is no popish innovation; and 
that the course pursued, from age to age, in reference to 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 101 

it, by the Eomish authorities, was only a necessary fol- 
lowing up of universally admitted principles. They 
well know that, had it been possible, at any moment, 
during the first five centuries, to have withdrawn this 
opinion, and these practices, altogether from the ecclesi- 
astical system, tfie entire structure of polity and worship 
must have crumbled to the dust, leaving nothing but tlie 
rudiments of Christianity — a system how vastly dif- 
ferent! 

One cannot then but be perplexed with the question, 
Why this foremost characteristic of ancient Christianity 
has been overlooked, as yet, by the Oxford divines. Let 
them, if they will, leave St. Bernard out of their view, 
for he is a papist; but how can they forget Cyprian and 
Tertullian ? let them be silent concerning the extrava- 
gances of St. Francis, or St. Dominic, but why do so 
little justice to Athanasius, to Chrysostom, to Jerome, to 
Ambrose, to Augustine, to Theodoret, to Basil, to the 
four Gregorys, to Leo, to Benedict, to Macarius, and to 
a host beside, as to say nothing concerning that one 
highly illuminated theme, upon which these great and 
good men made it their duty and their glory to expend 
the prime force of their eloquence, and upon which they 
strewed, on all occasions, the gayest and most fragrant 
flowers of their flowery rhetoric? whence has arisen this 
oversight? 

A singular oversight it must surely be regarded ; for, 
while these erudite divines, conversant as they are with 
Christian antiquity, (more so, perhaps, than with the 
real conditions of the age they live in,) are, in the tones 
of a solemn remonstrance, calling upon the church to 
retrace its heedless steps, and to realize, so far as possi- 
ble, an imitation of the religious notions and practices 



102 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

of the second and third centuries, and while they would 
fain render the apostolic English church a very copy 
(its sufferings excepted) of the church as we find it un- 
der Dionysius and Cyprian, yet exclude from their copy 
the most characteristic and prominent feature of their 
venerable pattern! If they reply that, on this one and 
only point, the doctrine and practices of the ancient 
church were mistaken, we grant it indeed ; but must 
then go on to say, that the error — theoretic and practi- 
cal — was of such a depth and magnitude as to bring the 
whole system, of which it formed so principal a part, 
under grave suspicion, and to render the utmost circum- 
spection indispensable, when we are called upon to be- 
lieve, or to do, this or that, because it was believed or 
done by the ancient church. 

Unable to con<Jeive of it as possible, that the Oxford 
waiters can simply have forgotten this foremost article 
of the faith and morals of the early church, 1 cannot but 
plainly express my conviction that they are not so devoid 
of worldly discretion, or so regardless of the temper of 
the times they live in, as not to have felt that, to protrude 
the ancient doctrine concerning the merits of virginity, 
at so early a stage of their proceedings, however " hap- 
pily omened," would have been a measure that must 
have proved instantly fatal to the cause they are pro- 
moting. Whatever whims or illusions the well-informed 
classes in this country may, for a time, give themselves 
up to, there is among us always a vigorous good sense, 
and a strong right feeling, in matter of morality — a sense 
of the fair and honest, such as would not have failed to 
resent with vehemence any endeavour, even the most 
cautious, to subvert the first principles of the social eco- 
nomy, and to poison the springs of natural sentiment. 



CVF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 103 

Every just and manly emotion, and every pure feminine 
emotion, would have been kindled, and would have 
covered with shame any attempt to bring back upon us 
the demure abominations, and the horrors of religious 
celibacy. The Oxford Tract writers have much yet to 
do — a Herculean task to perform, (not indeed to cleanse 
the stables of monkish pietism, but to deluge the land 
with their filth,) before they may venture so much as to 
whisper their desire to revive this great article of ancient 
Christianity, or to restore to its honours the — illustrior 
portio gregis Christi. This flos atque decus ecclesiastici 
germinis, is, let them believe it, withered to the root, 
and wo and shame to those who may strive to raise a 
new plant from its pernicious seeds ! 

And yet it is hard to say, if certain principles be 
granted, why we should not emulate that which the fa- 
thers, one and all, considered as the choicest part of 
Christianity — the fair, the ripened, and the fragrant fruit 
of its highest influences: if v/e are to imitate the subor- 
dinate characteristics of the same system, why not its 
principal ? Let us, as good protestants, reject with hor- 
ror the institutions of St. Dominic; but why abstain 
from those of St. Benedict? We will not choose to 
copy St. Cecelia, but why not follow St. Anthony? 
We loathe, perhaps, the principles of St. Ignatius Loy- 
ola, but dare we stop the ear at the soft call of St. 
Ephrem, and St. Basil, when they invite us to rend 
eveiy social tie by which we may be connected with 
the world, and to retire to a vacant cell next to their 
own ? 

Our ears have been so much and so long used to the 
sound (repeated by protestant writers, one after the other, 
and without any distinct reference to facts, and probably 



104 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

without any direct knowledge of them,) of the joro- 
gressive corruption of Christianity, and of the slow and 
steady advances of superstition and spiritual tyranny, 
that we are litde prepared to admit a contrary statement, 
better sustained by evidence, as well as more practically 
significant in itself — namely, that, although councils, or 
the papal authority, from age to age, followed up, im- 
bodied and legalized, certain opinions, usages, and prac- 
tices, which were already prevalent, in an undefined 
form, it very rarely pushed on far in advance of the 
feeling and habit of the times ; but that, on the contrary, 
it rather followed in the wake of ancient superstition and 
contemporary corruption, expressing, in bulls, decretals, 
and canons, (which were not seldom of a corrective 
kind,) the will or temper of the ecclesiastical body. Or 
to state the same general fact, as it is seen from another 
point of view, it will be found true that, if the opinion 
and sentiment of the church, at different eras, be regarded 
apart from the authorized expressions of the same, there 
will appear to have been far less o{ progression than we 
liave been taught to suppose; and that, on the contrary, 
the notions and usages of a later, differ extremely little, 
or not at all, from those of an earlier age; or that, so far 
as they do differ, the advantage, in respect of morality 
and piety, is quite as often on the side of the later, as of 
the earlier ages. Particular points had in view, it might 
be affirmed, that popery was a practicable form, and a 
corrected expression, of ancient Christianity. 

This is especially the case in reference to the subject 
which we have now before us ; nor do I at all hesitate 
to afl[irm, that pages, and pages again, may be adduced 
from writers of the second and third century, which, 
suppressing names and incidental allusions, an intelligent 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 105 

reader might easily suppose to have been taken from 
those of the twelfth or thirteenth century. What, then, 
I am peculiarly desirous to place in a conspicuous posi- 
tion, is, the fact that, instead of a regular and slow de- 
velopment of error, there was a very early expansion of 
false and pernicious notions, in their mature proportions, 
and these attended by some of their worst fruits. This, 
then, is the very point and hinge of our argument; and, 
in making good the weighty allegation, I shall use, not 
only all requisite diligence of research; but, as I trust, 
a strict and conscientious impartiality. It may be, in- 
deed, that later writers express themselves in more ful- 
some terms, or in worse taste than the earlier ; and it 
may be that the popes and saints of the middle ages ex- 
hibit less acquaintance with the classic models of style 
than was the boast of the well-taught doctors of the third 
and fourth centuries ; but, in the substance of their reli- 
gious system, and in extent of moral obliquity, they do 
not, I venture to say, a whit surpass them. The infe- 
rence affecting other and more disputed points of Chris- 
tian morality, ecclesiastical usage, and theological opi- 
nions, will force itself upon every thoughtful reader. 

And how well might our vigilance be quickened when 
highly respectable Romanist writers are heard affirming 
(and not without an appeal to good evidence,) as much, 
in behalf of the characteristic corruptions of their own 
church, as certain protestants among us are now affirm- 
ing in behalf of other ancient practices and opinions, 
authenticated in precisely the same mode, and to the 
same extent ! 

" The celibacy of the clergy," says Alban Butler, " is 
merely an ecclesiastical law, though perfectly conforma- 
ble to the spirit of the gospel, and doubtless derived from 

10 



106 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

the apostles." We have then to see whether the proof 
of the antiquity and universality of tlie opinions of 
which this law was merely a formal expression, be not 
as good as can be adduced in support of practices and 
principles now urged upon us, because ancient and " apos- 
tolic." 

In making good my general allegation, I shall adduce 
evidence in proof or illustration of the following five 
propositions, which, if established, may be held to su- 
persede much of the argument, otherwise requisite, in 
reference to points now actually under discussion ; at 
the same time, the passages to be cited will afford the 
means of exhibiting, in its true colours, the general con- 
dition of the ancient church, moral and religious, and 
will, therefore, serve to dissipate the illusions that are 
apt to surround the objects of remote antiquity. My pro- 
positions are — 

I. That the lapse of eight hundred or a thousand years 
exhibits very little, if any, progression, in the quality or 
extravagance of those notions which gave support to the 
practices of religious celibacy; and that the attendant 
abuses of this system were nearly, or quite, as flagrant 
at the earlier, as at the later date. 

II. That, at the very earliest time when we find these 
notions and practices to have been generally prevalent, 
and accredited, they were no novelties; but had come 
down from a still earlier era. 

III. That, as these notions and practices are of imme- 
morial antiquity, so did they affect the church universal 
— -eastern, western, and African; and that thus they come 
fully within the terms of the rule — quod semper, quod 
ubique, quod ab omnibus. 

IV. That these opinions and practices,, in their mo&t 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 107 

extreme form, received an ample and explicit sanction, 
and a solemn authentication from all the great writers 
and doctors of the church, during the most prosperous 
and enlightened age of any preceding the reformation; 
and that, on this head, popery has no peculiar culpabi- 
lity. 

V. That the notions and practices connected with the 
doctrine of the superlative merit of religious celibacy, 
were*, at once, the causes and the effects of errors in the- 
ology, of perverted moral sentiments, of superstitious 
usages, of hierarchical usurpations; and that they fur- 
nish us with a criterion for estimating the general value 
OF ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY; and, in a word, afford reason 
enough for regading, if not with jealousy, at least with 
extreme caution, any attempt to induce the modern 
church to imitate the ancient church. 



THE FIRST PROPOSITION. 

My first thesis, then, is to this effect — 

That no essential change, or progressive deterioration, 
took place during the course of many centuries, dating 
from what is called the pristine age of the church, in re- 
gard to the notions entertained concerning the merit and 
angelic virtues of celibacy; and that the extreme evils 
usually considered as inseparable from these notions, at- 
tached to them from the earliest times; or in other words, 
that the vices and absurdities of Romanism, on this 



108 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

ground, are only the vices and absurdities of ancient 
Christianity. 

For the purpose of establishing the position here as- 
sumed, and which, if actually made good, will go far 
toward clearing a path over the ground of the present 
controversy, I shall study brevity and condensation, as 
far as may consist with a satisfactory and (if it were pos- 
sible) a final treatment of this initial portion of the ar- 
gument. It will manifestly be requisite to adduce pas- 
sages, first from some two or three of the authenticated 
writers of the later and mature times of Romanism, by 
the side of which must be placed analogous, or parallel 
quotations from the leading Ante-Nicene fathers; and on 
a comparison of the two, it will be for calm and candid 
minds to determine whether my first thesis affirms more 
than ought to have been asserted. 

It was not, as I have already said, the authorities of 
the Romish church — popes, cardinals, councils, that 
pushed forward the system of spiritual prostitution, su- 
perstition and tyranny; but much rather a deeply-work- 
ing spirit acting from within the church; and this spirit 
is one and the same, whether uttering itself from the fer- 
vid lips of St. Dominic de Guzman, or St. Bernard, or 
the not less fervid lips of a father of the second and 
third century. This spirit proved itself in fact to be far 
more potent than the authority which the popes them- 
selves exerted, even about the walls of the Vatican. A 
curious instance presents itself, with which I may com- 
mence my series of testimonies. So late as the twelfth 
century many of the monastic institutions continued to be 
of an open kind; that is to say, some of the religious esta- 
blishments were merely lodging-houses, for persons pro- 
fessing more assiduity in the offices of piety than their 



OF THE ANCIENT CHUItCtf, 109 

neighbours; and where the freest access was allowed to 
the parents and friends of the mis-called, recluses. In 
other cases, even residence in the nunnery was dispensed 
with, so that those who had enrolled themselves as mem- 
bers of a certain society, and as intending to adhere to 
the rules of the order, continued to live with their friends; 
and to mix pretty freely in general society. This laxity 
of practice, open as it must have been to abuses, and 
being as it was a departure from the practices of the early 
^ges, and tending to weaken much the hold which the 
church might have had over the entire system, had long 
engaged the zealous endeavours of Innocent III. to re- 
dress it; but he, despot as he was, had laboured with 
little success, even in Rome itself, to effect an absolute in- 
carceration of all who liad bound themselves by the mo- 
nastic rules, and to seclude them effectively, not from 
the world merely, but from their nearest relatives. The 
letters of this pope betray, at once, his extreme anxiety 
to bring about this necessary reform, and the vexa- 
tion with which he witnessed the small success of his 
endeavours. But wherein a pope, and such a pope as In- 
nocent III. fails, and confesses himself over-malched, a 
Dominic easily triumphs, after only a second effort, and 
Avithout the necessity of exhibiting more than a single 
and customary miracle. To the vagrant and giddy nuns 
of Rome, this saint had offered his own newly elected 
monastery, in that city; with the hope of tempting them 
to abandon the laxity of their practice; and at length he 
obtained their reluctant consent to make this sumptuous 
palace of poverty their abode, and their prison. Their 
alarmed relatives, however, succeeded in bringing them 
to renounce their inconsiderate promise; nor was it until 
after a new and more strenuous exertion of his spiritual 

10* 



110 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

influence, that he finally triumphed over the impulses, 
as well of their better, as of their worse natures. On 
Ash-Wednesday, 1218, the abbess, and some of her nuns 
— the elder sisters probably (of the monastery of St. 
Mary beyond the Tiber) went to take possession of their 
new abode; where they found already, the saint, in con- 
ference with three cardinals — commissioners, in this in- 
stance, with himself. But hardly had the first compli- 
ments passed, between these reverend persons, when it 
was suddenly announced by a messenger, tearing his hair 
to admiration, that a young nobleman, named Napoleon,* 
and who was tbe nephew of one of the said cardinals, 
had just been thrown from his horse, and — killed on the 
spot! Forthwith the conference is broken off, and the 
lifeless and lacerated body is, by command of the " thau- 
maturgus of the age," brought within doors: mass is said 
— the saint, in celebrating the divine mysteries, shed a 
flood of tears, and while elevating the body of Christ in 
his pure hands, he was himself, in an ecstasy, lifted up 
a whole cubit from the ground, in the sight, and to the 
amazement, of all who were present. After awhilp, 
and as might have been expected, while St. Dominic 
himself continued suspended in the air, he cried, with a 
loud voice, '* Napoleon, I say to thee, in the name of 
our Lord Jesus Christ, arise." That instant, in the 
sight of the whole multitude, the young man arose, 
sound and whole! What then could the refractory or 
reluctant nuns of St. Mary do, but, at the bidding of this 

* This morning-star of the race of Napoleon, could, no doubt, 
Bham dead as handsomely, and naturally, as his illustrious name- 
sake, of our times, acted the part of a good musulman, or a good 
catholicj when needful. 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. Ill 

raiser of the dead, rush into the net prepared for them; 
and pine away the residue of their years, within the 
gloomy walls of the monastery of St. Sixtus? 

But now, you say, all this is mere popery; and what 
have we to do with its superstitions, or with the impi- 
ous frauds that were perpetrated to give them credit? 
What we have to do with these things is this — to retrace 
the course of time, a thousand years, or nearly as much, 
and there and then to discover, in the bosom of the pris- 
tine and martyr church, not perhaps the very same forms, 
usages, frauds, follies; but those substantial elements of 
religious opinion, and of moral sentiment, which gave 
support to all these abominations, and apart from which 
thev would never have had existence. This then is the 
gist of our present argument — that there is absolutely 
nothing in the ripe popery of the times of St. Dominic 
(certain elaborate modes of proceeding excepted) which 
is not to be found in the Christianity of the times of 
Cyprian or of Tertullian. 

The last named father I reserve to be placed side by 
side with a kindred spirit of the middle ages; and at 
present turn to the mild, pious, and judicious, as well as 
eloquent, martyr, archbishop of Carthage. Let us then, 
at a leap of one thousand years, pass the abyss of popery, 
and imagine ourselves fairly landed upon the terra firma 
of pristine purity — the realm of the still bleeding and vo- 
luntary church, whence may be descried, like a waning 
twilight, the brightness of the apostolic age. The pas- 
sages I am to offer are not merely highly significant, 
in themselves, and indispensable as links in our argu- 
ment, but they tend directly to lay open what was the 
real condition, spiritual and ecclesiastical, of the early 
church. In abridging, so far as may be requisite, my 



112 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

quotations, and in taking single expressions from para* 
graphs, I stand pledged (and am open to an easy rebuke 
if detected in any wilful perversions) to omit nothing 
which, if adduced, might serve to contravene the infer- 
ence I have in view; and if, on the other hand, I am 
compelled to retrench not a little which would most 
pointedly support that inference, I do so in deference to 
the propriety which our modern refinement prescribes. 
Whoever will look into the authors cited will, I am sure, 
admit that, to have availed myself of the materials before 
me in a less scrupulous manner, would not a little have 
strengthened the position I maintain. 

You will not tell me that you are already familiar with 
the passages which you foresee I shall fix upon ; and 
that the general fact which they are adduced to illustrate, 
is sufficiently understood, and is generally admitted. 
This may perhaps be true, though one would not think 
it when one listens to the customary style, either of the 
favourers of antiquity, or of its impugners, who, on the 
one part, seem to be discreetly concealing the real and 
simple facts, which, on the other side, appear to be but 
slenderly or confusedly apprehended. The time, how- 
ever, is come when it is indispensable that we should 
make ourselves thoroughly and authentically familiar 
with whatever w^e have the means of knowing, concern- 
ing ancient Christianity. 

At a time not more remote from the apostolic age, 
than we, of this generation, are from the times of Bar- 
row, Tillotson, Taylor, Baxter, we find all the elements 
of the abuses of the twelfth century, and, not the ele- 
ments only, but most of those abuses in a ripened, nay, 
iw a putrescent condition. 

Cyprian, and his presbyters, writes, in reply to Pom- 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 113 

ponius, a snfTragan bishop, who had reported certain 
scandals, in treating which he needed direction and au- 
thoritative support. From this letter it appears that the 
rash and unwarrantable vow of perpetual celibacy, or 
virginity, taken, or forced upon multitudes of young 
women, in some moment of artificial religious excitement, 
had been too late repented of by many of its victims, 
who, finding themselves cut off from the virtuous en- 
dearments of domestic life, had rushed into irregularities, 
loading their conscience at once with a real, and a su- 
pererogatory guilt, and had, under the colour of spiritual 
intercourse with the clergy to whose care they had been 
consigned, and who themselves were galled by the same 
impious extravagance, admitted the grossest familiarities, 
and thus had diffused an extreme corruption of manners 
among the very men to whom were intrusted the moral 
and religious welfare of the people. So early had this 
false fervour produced its poisonous fruit, and had ulce- 
rated, in its vitals, the body of the church! *' Concern- 
ing those," says Cyprian, " who, after having solemnly 
devoted themselves to continence, have been found co- 
habiting with men — detectae in eodem lecto pariter man- 
sisse cum masculis — yet professing themselves inviolate 
—cum viris dormisse confessse sint .... you have de- 
sired my advice. You well know that we do not recede 
from the evangelic and apostolic traditions .... and 
that, in regard to the welfare of all, church discipline is 
to be maintained .... wherefore it is by no means to 
be allowed that young women should (non dico simul 
dormire) live with men. If indeed they have cordially 
dedicated themselves to Christ, let them modestly and 
chastely, and without subterfuge, hold to their purpose, 
and, thus constant and firm, look for the reward of vir- 



114 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

ginity — praemium virginitatis. — But if in fact they will 
not (vel non possunt) so persevere, let them marry* 

Take your Cyprian from the shelf, and tell me whether 
the passages, and the expressions I have omitted, do not 
make it certain, that this pretended *' Apostolic institu- 
tion," namely, of religious celibacy, or, as it was called, 
dedication or espousals to Christ, had not already, and 
Bven amidst the fires of persecution, become the imme^ 
diate occasion, in a very extensive degree, to licentious 
practices, which must have been fatal to all piety, as well 
as frightful in themselves. In truth, if we are thinking 
of the preservation of morality at large, or of the purity 
of the church in particular, I could not, for my own part, 
hesitate to prefer the tremendous irreversible vows, and 
the dungeon monasteries of later times, to the loose fa- 
natical profligacy of the times of Cyprian. If we are to 
hear much more of the purity of the early church, there 
will be no choice left but to quote Cyprian and Tertul- 
iian, without retrenchment. 

*' And if all," continues this truly faithful pastor, "are 
bound to observe a necessary discipline, how much more 
are those bound to do so who should afford an example 
to others ! How shall they, the clergy, praepositos et 
diaconos, be guides in the path of piety and virtue, if, 
in fact, from ihem proceeds a contaminating warranty of 
vice ! . . . . Thou hast therefore well done in withdraw- 
ing from the deacon and others, qui cum virginibus dor- 
mire consueverunt." 

Nothing could place in a stronger light the absurdity, 
and the inevitable abuses, inseparable from this ancient 
practical error, than to mention the ineffably degrading, 
as well as precarious condition upon which, by Cy- 
prian's directions, was to depend the restoration of the 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 115 

guilty, or of the suspected, to the communion of the 
church — a condition of which he had himself intimated 
his distrust (cum .... ssepe fallatur) but this we forego, 
only remarking the significant fact, as attaching to so 
early a time, that already a rational solicitude concern- 
ing spiritual and moral character, had been displaced by 
a stupid regard to what was merely external and formal. 
Did the religious character of these loose ladies gain 
any real warranty from the report of the obstetrix ? Or 
were their clerical paramours rendered more fit teachers 
of Christianity by the issue of any such ordeals ? Al- 
ready had the first principles of the social system, as 
divinely constituted, been so perverted, and the senti- 
ments of real virtue so broken in upon, by this perni- 
cious system of factitious super-human piety, that the 
sexes could no longer be sufi'ered, with any safety, even 
to live together under the same roof! and thus, as it re- 
garded the ministers of religion, at least, the whole of 
that happy and genial influence which is found to result 
from Christianized domestic relations, was turned aside; 
and in its place came habits and modes of feeling, which 
may not be described or contemplated. But all this evil 
sprang from the desire to make up a loftier sort of reli- 
gion than that which God had given to the world ! 

The palliations that may be found for these grievous 
errors, and the almost inevitable infatuation which held 
the minds of those who had been trained to support and 
reverence them, and the relation they bore to the ex- 
treme corruptions of the times, and also to the frequent 
and severe sufferings to which the church, during three 
centuries, was exposed — these themes of extenuation are 
not now our subject; — an occasion may perhaps present 
itself, for ofTering a general apology in behalf of those 



116 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

whom now we are arraigning. What we have at pre- 
sent to do with, is the fact of an early and extensive re- 
ligious ilUision; and tlie inferences this fact involves. 
Let this, however, be said, that the church, looking 
abroad upon the universal and frightful dijssoluteness of 
the heathen world, conceived the belief that the enor- 
mous evil could never be amended by applying to it the 
simple, firm, and natural morality of the gospel, as pro- 
mulgated by Christ, and his apostles; but they thought 
it could be counteracted, if at all, by nothing but a spe- 
cies of virtue that was exaggerated in a proportionate 
degree. This artificial purity, was then a violent re- 
action, ending, as might have been foreseen, and as 
every convulsive moral struggle must, in a correspon- 
dent corruption, as well of manners, as of principles. 
It is curious, in this point of view, to compare our Cy- 
prian's rhetorical description of the dissoluteness of his 
times (ad Donatum) with the facts admitted, or indicated, 
by himself, in his endeavours to repress the spreading 
plague within the church; not that the practices them- 
selves were equally flagitious; but yet were they ren- 
dered the more culpable by those advantages of light 
in which the heathen had no part. 

How much turns often (and it is an observation per- 
petually offering itself in the perusal of church history) 
upon an insensible substitution of a technical, for the 
general and genuine sense of an ethical term! It was 
just by the aid of some of these hardly perceptible sub- 
stitutions that the eminent men we have now to do with 
(and Cyprian not less than any) found the ready means 
of gaining an apparent scriptural warranty for practices 
flagrantly contravening the spirit and meaning of scrip- 
tural morality. Thus it is that he reiterates his quota- 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 117 

tions from the Psalms, and the Book of Proverbs, in 
support of that ecclesiastical discipline which the vow of 
celibacy involved, by adducing texts in which the in- 
struction, correction, or reproof recommended by David 
or Solomon is rendered disciplina, in the Latin version 
of the Old Testament, which he used : as thus — " Those 
who refuse instruction shall perish;'* or, as the Latin 
has it — " those shall perish," and under the anger of 
the Lord, who infringe the rules of this artificial disci- 
pline, enjoined for enforcing the system of factitious pu- 
rity. Tertullian, long before, had appropriated this term 
in the same manner. The Greek Church writers em- 
ploy the word philosophy in a sense nearly equivalent. 

But we have yet to see what those generally received 
and accredited notions were, to which the shepherds of 
the church ordinarily appealed, when handling the sub- 
ject of religious celibacy, and which so sober-minded a 
prelate as Cyprian alleges as the foundation of his com- 
mands and exiiortations, when labouring to repress the 
abuses which, at this early period, had come in, like an 
inundation upon the church. An exposition of these no- 
tions and opinions we find placed in the front of the 
treatise, or dehortation, " concerning the attire of vir- 
gins," (nuns) that is to say, of those who had dedicated 
their bodies, as well as their souls, to the Lord; and 
who, under the designation of the spouses of Christ, 
held a distinct place as a visible order, or sodality, in 
the ecclesiastical system, taking rank above the class of 
widows, and second only to the confessors, or those who 
had triumphantly sustained torture from the hand of the 
heathen. 

Nov/ it appears, too plainly, from the stern reproba- 

II 



118 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

4ions, and the indignant, yet repressed flourishes which 
mark this treatise, that a laxity, nay a licentiousness, 
hardly to be believed, and little suspected by the gene- 
ral readers of church history, had become common 
among these religious ladies, of the church of Carthage. 
In fact, it cannot be doubted that, to indemnify themselves 
for the abjuration of the virtuous happiness of domestic 
life, they had become proficients in every meretricious 
allurement, not merely bestowing extraordinary cares 
and costs upon the attractions of dress and jewelleryy 
and frequenting scenes of indecent revelry, but inviting 
and allowing the grossest familiarities on the part of 
their spiritual guides, to whom they had a too easy ac- 
cess; and even yielding themselves to shameless ex- 
posures in the public baths, of which ablutions the good 
bishop well and smartly says, such washings do not 
cleanse, but pollute the body, and not only the body, but 
the soul. That the indecencies of the Carthagenian 
nuns were not a single instance of irregularity, may be 
gathered from the very express and detailed reference to 
the same practices made, some years earlier, by Clement 
of Alexandria, who, in fact, uses expressions which one 
might believe Cyprian to have read. So much for the 
boasted purity of the pristine age of the church ! How 
much longer is common sense to be outraged by the re- 
petition of this miserably unmeaning phrase — unmean- 
ing, unless applied with the greatest caution, and a se- 
vere limitation, to a very brief period, and to a few bright 
spots ! 

*' But now," continues our zealous and upright pre- 
late, "I have to address myself to the virgins, (nuns,) 
whom, as their reputation is so much the more exalted, 
we must make X\iQ objects of a proportionate care. 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 119^ 

These, in truth, are the flowers of the ecclesiastical 
plant, the grace and ornament of the heavenly grace; a 
gladsome produce, a work whole and incorrupt of all 
honour and all praise; the image of God, reflecting the 
sanctity of the Lord, and the most illustrious portion of 
Christ's flock. By these (nuns) and in these, is the 
noble fecundity of mother church recommended, and 
made copiously to flourish; and just by so much as this 
plentiful virginity swells its numbers, does the mother 
herself augment her joys. It is to these, then, that I 
speak; it is these I proceed to exhort; yet in aflection, 
rather than in the tones of authority." 

I must here remark that, already, the constant and in- 
evitable tendency of a system, essentially superstitious, 
to fix the attention, even of the best men, with more so- 
licitude, upon what is extrinsic and symbolic, than upon 
what is moral, spiritual, and rational, had fully deve- 
loped itself in Cyprian's time — indeed it is the general 
characteristic of the early (as of later) church writers ; 
and it is the capital article of the contrast which so 
forcibly strikes us in comparing the entire body of an- 
cient religious literature with the scriptures. The apos- 
tles, without contemning or forgetting that which is ex- 
terior, give all their serious cares to that which is sub- 
stantial — to the weighty matters of the soul's condition, 
spiritual and moral. The fathers, on the contrary, with- 
out contemning, or altogether forgetting, that which is 
substantial, are fretting themselves perpetually, (like 
their modern admirers,) and chafing, about that which 
is subsidiary only, and visible; the form, the institution, 
the discipline, the canon; in a word, the husk of reli- 
gion, fondly thinking that, so long as the rind and shell 
€f piety could be preserved without a flaw, there could 



120 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

be no doubt of the preservation of the kernel ! Alas ! 
these ill-directed anxieties left the adversary, at his lei- 
sure, to perforate the shell and to withdraw the kernel, 
almost to the last atom ! Thus our good archbishop, 
after saying that " the continence and pudicity proper to 
a nun do not consist merely in the inviolate perfection 
of tlie body," leads the modern reader, at least, to sur- 
mise that he is about to recommend the inward and spi- 
ritual grace of genuine purity of heart; but no, this is 
not what he is thinking of — '' True modesty, beside the 
integrity of the body, consists in — the fair and modest 
attire and ornament of the person!" Here is excellent 
quakerism, as well as popery, and both sixteen hundred 
years old ! 

" How shall they receive the wages of virginity, 
which they are looking for from the Lord, unless it be 
evident that they are, labouring to please him, and none 
other? .... What, then, can such have to do with those 
terrestrial decorations which are attractive to the eyes, 
not of the Lord, but of men ? as Paul says — If I seek 
to please men, I am no longer the servant of Christ. 
What do ornaments mean ; what means decking of the 
hair, except to one who either has, or who is seeking a 
husband ? . . . . Peter dehorts married women from an 
excessive ornamenting of their persons, who might plead, 
in excuse of their fault, the will and taste of their hus- 
bands ; but what excuse can virgins find for a like re- 
gard to dress, who are liable to no such interference ? . . . 
Thou, if thou goest abroad, frequenting public places, 
sumptuously arrayed, alluring the eyes of youth, draw- 
ing after thee the sighs of admirers, fomenting lawless 
passions, and kindling the sparks of desire, and even, if 
not destroying thyself, destroying others, and presenting 



OF THE ANCIENt CHtlRCH. 121 

to their bosoms a poisoned dagger, canst not excuse thy- 
self on the pretence of preserving a mind pure and mo- 
dest. Thy pretext is shamed by thy criminal attire and 
thy immodest decorations ; nor shouldst thou be reck- 
oned among the maids of Christ, who so livest as if 
wishing to captivate and to be loved by another." 

After reprehending, at length, and on various grounds, 
costly and meretricious decorations of the person — the 
means and materials of which, says the good bishop, 
following Tertullian, were given to mankind by the 
apostate angels, he proceeds to specify and reprove still 
more criminal excesses which had become matter of 
scandal, within and without the church, and had afforded 
too much colour to the calumnies of the heathen. Such 
were, the being present at weddings, *' and hearing and 
taking part in licentious conversations ; hearing what 
offends good morals, and seeing what must not be spoken 
of. . . What have the virgins of the church to do at pro- 
miscuous baths ; and there to violate the commonest 
dictates of feminine modesty! . , . Sordidat lavatio ista, 
nonabluit; nee emundat membra, sed maculat. Impu- 
dice tu neminem conspicis, sed ipsa conspiceris impu- 
dice : oculos tuos turpi oblectatione non polluis, sed dum 
oblectas alios, ipsa poll ueris. . . . The places (baths) you 
frequent are more filthy than the theatre itself; all mo- 
desty is there laid aside, and with your robes, your per- 
sonal honour and reserve are cast off. . . Thus it is that 
the church so often has to weep for her virgins; so does 
she bewail their infamy, and the horrid tales which get 
abroad. . . ." 

" Listen, then, to him who seeks your true welfare; 
lest, cast off by the Lord, ye be widows before ye be 
married; adulteresses, not to husbands, but to Christ, 



122 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

and, after having been destined to the highest rewards, 
ye undergo the severest punishments. . . For, consider, 
while the hundred-fold produce is that of the martyrs, 
the sixty-fold is yours ; and as they (the martyrs) con- 
temn the body and its delights, so should you. Great 
are the wages which await you, (if faithful ;) the high 
reward of virtue, the great recompense to be conferred 
upon chastity. Not only shall your lot and portion (in 
the future life) be equal to that of the other sex ; but ye 
shall be equal to the angels of God !" 

So much then for the zealous and upright Cyprian, 
and his delinquent stew of ecclesiastical virginity, at Car- 
thage, and so much for the venerable sanctity of the pris- 
tine age! You will grant, I think, that the urgent con- 
troversy which we have now to do with, and which 
turns so much upon the alleged authority of antiquity, 
renders this species of evidence, unpleasing as it is in 
itself, yet very pertinent in reference to the general ques- 
tion. I cannot however proceed to call in my next pair 
of witnesses, without adverting to a fact which forces it- 
self upon every well informed and reflecting reader of 
the early Christian writers, I mean the much higher 
moral condition, and the more efl^ective discipline of the 
Romisii church in later times, than can with any truth 
be claimed for the ancient church, even during its era of 
suffering and depression. Our ears are stunned with 
the outcry against the " corruptions of popery." I 
boldly say that popery, foul as it is, and has ever been, 
in tlie mass, might yet fairly represent itself as a reform 
upon early Christianity, Do not accuse me of the wish 
to startle you with paradoxes. I will not swell my pages 
(which will have enough to bear) with quotations from 
modern books that are in the hands of most religious 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 123 

readers. In truth, volumes of unimpeachable evidence 
might be produced, establishing the fact, that the later 
Romish church has had to boast eminent virtues, in con- 
nexion with her monastic institutions; and I think virtues, 
better compacted, and more consistent than belonged to 
the earlier church. Or, to refer to a single instance, look 
into the various narratives that have been published re- 
lating to the Port-royal institution, as governed by the 
illustrious Angelica Arnauld. There was popery entire; 
every element of the system developed, and expanded, 
under the fervours of the most intense reliorious excite- 
ment! I beg you then, in idea, to place, by the side of 
this band of virgins of the seventeenth century, Cyprian's 
dissolute crew, the decus et ornamentum, of the martyr 
times of the church! If you say these are picked in- 
stances, I deny it, so far as my argument is concerned 
in the comparison; and I affirm the general fact that the 
measures taken by the Romish church, at different pe- 
riods, to enforce the celibacy of the clergy, and to bring 
the monastic institution under the tremendous, but neces- 
sary sanctions which at length were resorted to for hold- 
ing it entire, were in the main, measures of reform, found, 
by abundant and lengthened experience, to be indispen- 
sable as the means of excluding, or repressing the worst 
abuses; — that is to say, so long as the core of the institu- 
tion — the immemorial doctrine of religious celibacy, was 
to be maintained, in the position it had ever held, as an 
essential element of Christianity. In a word, the plain fact 
is, that this foremost and hinging article of ancient Christi- 
anity, after having, from century to century, been im- 
bodied in a milder or less compact form, and its usages 
enforced with less rigour, and after having in this loose 
form, ulcerated the church in a frightful manner, was at 



124 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

length brought into some order by the strenuous hand of 
authority, aided indeed by the mad fanaticism of certain 
fiery spirits. The venerable doctrine of the merit of re- 
ligious celibacy has proved itself to be utterly impracti- 
cable under any conditions less severe than those which 
have, since the middle ages, rendered the religious houses, 
when vigorously governed, dens of cruelty and despair. 
But then nothing can be more inequitable than to charge 
these horrors upon Romanism. The church of Rome 
has done, in these instances, the best it could, to bring 
the cumbrous abomination bequeathed to it by the saints 
and doctors and martyrs of the pristine age, into a ma- 
nageable condition. And if we are to hear much more 
of the ''corruptions of popery," as opposed to *' primi- 
tive purity," there will be no alternative but freely to 
lay open the sewers of the early church, and to allow 
them to disgorge their contents upon the wholesome air. 
We must now, however, pursue our proposed chairi 
of evidences a little farther, and for the purpose of sub- 
stantiating, by more than one or two instances, the ge- 
neral proposition, that the lapse of many centuries, though 
it might give form and consistency to certain mistaken 
notions, did not materially, if at all, advance the princi- 
ples whence the whole system originated. This is the 
very point which, in my view at least, is more than any 
other, of importance in relation to the controversy at 
present agitated, and you must pardon me, if I seem to 
be taking unnecessary pains in fully establishing it. On 
these subjects utter misapprehensions have extensively 
prevailed, which will not easily give way. Before we 
reprobate popes, councils, and Romanist saints, let us 
fairly see what sort of system it was which the doctors 
and martyrs of the highest antiquity had delivered into 
Uieir care and custody. We protestants aie prompt 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 125 

enough to condemn the ponliiTs, or St. Bernard; but let 
inquiry be made concerning the Christianity imbodied 
in the writings of those to whom popes and doctors 
looked up, as their undoubted masters. 

There can hardly be a more pertinent comparison^ in 
relation to our present purpose, than the one I now in- 
stitute between the illustrious and highly gifted, as well 
as potent abbot of Clairvaux, and his fiery predecessor 
in the same field of labour, Tertullian. In such a pa- 
rallel we find, brought into opposition, not indeed the 
formal institutions, and the legalized practices of the an- 
cient, and of the later church, which are circumstantials 
only, variable in themselves, and of no importance in 
relation to any controversy that can be carried on among 
protestants; but the intimate character, or, as Lord Bacon 
woukl have termed it, the inner form, of the two systems, 
which in truth are not two, but one and the same. An 
interval of nine hundred years is surely a sufficient space 
for showing, in any case, and very distinctly, the gradual 
operation of time, in modifying opinions, and usages, 
whether secular or ecclesiastical. If little or no pro- 
gression be discernible within the compass of almost a 
thousand years, we may pretty confidently assume that 
the system in question had reached its maturity at the 
earliest date. In truth, the period marked off from the 
entire field of church history, by these two remarkable 
names, may properly be considered as inclusive of all 
those characteristics of ancient Christianity, which can 
have any bearing upon modern controversies. Popery 
has at no moment of its entire existence, been more it- 
self, than it was in the age of St. Bernard, and of his 
nurseling, Innocent IL, nor is ancient Christianity, 
as distinguished from the Christianity of the New Tes- 



126 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

tament, to be met with any where else (at this early date) 
SO vividly pictured, as in the writings of the African 
presbyter. Nor can any fair demur be taken against 
him (so far as my present purpose is concerned) either on 
the general ground, of the intemperance and extravagance 
of his dispositions, or the particular ground of his fall 
into Montanism; inasmuch as I shall avail myself of his 
expressions only so far as they may safely be considered 
as indicative of the sentiments of the church at the time, 
as well as of practices then prevalent, and so far too, as 
these expressions and sentiments were afterwards caught 
up, authenticated, and expanded, by the series of catho- 
lic writers, beginning with his contemporaries, and on- 
wards. In this instance I foresee and preclude the ob- 
jection which will be raised against Tertullian's evidence, 
by confining myself to passages which may be matched, 
substantially, from the works of the most orthodox and 
the most esteemed fathers. 

But it is necessary to my purpose, first to give a sam- 
ple of the ripe Catholicism (in this particular feature of 
the ecclesiastical system) of the twelfth century; and 
then to compare with it the boasted "pristine Christi- 
anity," of the second or third century; that is to say, of 
a period when the immediate successors of the apostles 
were still personally remembered. 

The religious course, character, and writings of St. 
Bernard are, ia a very extraordinary degree, fraught with 
pertinent and affecting instruction, and I should venture 
to say that a full and dispassionate statement of what this 
eminent man felt, and professed to feel, and of what he 
did, and of what he incited others to do, or permitted 
them to cloak with his name, would afiford as effective 
a caution as could be found against the lamentable illu- 
sions by which fervent religious minds, in every age. 



\ 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 127 

have been endangered. At the present moment, the un- 
expected appearance, and wide prevalence of a species 
of religion vividly exemplified in the character and con- 
duct of St. Bernard, mark him as the very instance which 
young and ardent minds should seriously consider. 

The animated, spirit-stirring writings of this father, as 
entertaining as they are instructive, abound with tender, 
as well as vehement and vituperative reproofs of the cor- 
ruptions prevailing in the church, in his times, and espe- 
cially of the abuses which, in every age, have been con- 
nected with the unnatural doctrine and practice of reli- 
gious celibacy. A volume might be filled with these re- 
monstrant rhapsodies. " Heartily do I wish," says he, 
addressing the clergy, "that it were more the practice 
among us, of those who undertake to build a tower, to 
sit down first, and count the cost, lest haply they find 
themselves wanting in the means to finish their work. 
Heartily do I wish that those who, as it seems, have so 
little command over their passions, and rashly make pro- 
fession of perfection, would scruple to enrol their names 
in the lists of celibacy. Costly indeed is this tower, 
and of great import is that word which all cannot re- 
ceive. Better far were it to secure salvation on the low 
level of the faithful commonalty, than, in the loftiness 
of the clerical dignity, to live worse than they, and to 
be judged more severely." Expressions these, verj 
nearly resembling those of St, Cyprian, above riied^ 

One's heart might bleed in following some of St. Ber- 
nard's amplifications on this subject. But no proof of 
the impracticability, or of the pernicious tendency, or of 
the cruelty of this main article of ancient Christianity ,. 
could avail to lead even those who best understood hu- 
man nature, to call in question either its- validity or its 



128 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

excellence : on the contrary, the worse it was found to- 
be in its working, (and this is an ordinary occurrence in 
matters of religion,) the more extravagant were the en-^ 
comiums lavished upon it. 1 need hardly remind you 
that, in St. Bernard's sense, the term chastity does not 
mean that Christian and rational purity of the heart 
which the apostles recommend, and wl»icii they urge as 
well upon the married as the unmarried ; but that artifi- 
cial and external purity of the monastic system, to which 
the married could make no pretensions. 

"What so fair as this chastity, — which makes, of a 
man, an angel ? A chaste man and an angel differ in- 
deed as to felicity, but not as to virtue; for, although 
the purity of the angel be the happier of the two, that 
of the man must be admitted to be the more energetic. 
It is chastity, and that alone, which, in this abode of 
mortality, holds forth the state of immortal glory. This 
alone,, (on earth,) where the rites of marriage are so- 
lemnized, vindicates the manners of that blessed region, 
where they neither marry, nor are given in marriage; 
offering, as one may say, an example, or experiment, on 
earth, of that heavenly mode of life. . . In this earthly 
vessel of ours is contained the fragrant balsam, (of chas- 
tity,) by virtue of which the mortal elements are con- 
served incorrupt 'i'his is the glory of the single 

life, to live the life of an angel, while occupying the body, 
as of a beast." 

This is the string, harped upon again and again, that 
the religious coelebs was " an angel among beings of an 
inferior order." 

'' Who, then, should scruple to call the life of the re- 
ligious coslebs a celestial, an angelic life 1 or what will 
all the elect be in the resurrection, which ye are not even 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 129 

now, as the angels of God in heaven, who abstain from 
matrimonial connexions ? Ye grasp, my beloved brethren, 
the pearl of great price ; ye grasp that sanctity which 
renders you like to the saints (in glory) and the home 
servants of God, as saith the scripture — Incorruptness 
pi*\ces us next to God* Not by your own merits^' are ye 
what ye are ; but by the grace of God : and, as to chas- 
tity and sanctity, I may call you — terrestrial angels, 
or rather citizens of heaven, although still pilgrims upon 
earth ; for, so long as we are in the body, we are absent 
from the Lord." In all this, and paores to the same ef- 
fect miiiht easily be adduced, you will not fail to notice 
that constant characteristic of the fathers — the appropria- 
tion, or usurpation of the Scriptures, in behalf of ther 
elite of the churcli ; thus depriving the mass of Chris- 
tians of almost all their siiare in its promises and con- 
solations. In a word, the entire system of ancient 
Christianity, was a monopoly of salvation, leaving, to all 
but the few, nothing better than a remote and precarious 
probability of an ultimate and far distant escape from 
perdition. Was this the gospel, preached by the apos- 
tles ? Yet, as we shall see, it was the natural conse- 
quence of the false principle we are now exposing; and 
it is a consequence inseparable from every similar error 
in regard to Christian institutions. 

While St. Bernard is before me, I must notice a par- 
ticular, which I may hereafter lose sight of, but which 
well deserves a passing observation, in connexion with 
the system of sentiments recommended in the Oxford 
Tracts. Our author was a most ardent and loquacious, 
nay, I must really say, a most gallant admirer of the 
queen of heaven. Very many entire pages of fulsome 
and florid rhetoric are devoted to her peculiar honour, 

12 



130 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

and every epilhet that the most exorbitant superstition 
could coin, animated by sundry erotic phrases, is coined^ 
or adapted to the purpose of lifting this " unique being," 
ihe **dispensatrix of the universe," and ''dowager of cre- 
ation," above the level of things finite. It is, therefore, 
only what we miglit expect, that St. Bernard is a great 
stickler for that capital article of ancient orthodoxy — 
the '' perpetual virginity of the blessed Mary," a denial of 
which actually horrified every stanch churchman. But 
why, it may be asked, was there all this anxiety on a 
point, apparently so remote from any practical bearing ? 
Why? — because tlie blessed Virgin — ''always virgin," 
as the Oxford writers are now telling us, with a solemn 
and significant emphasis, — was wanted, as the patroness 
of celibacy, and ihe bright example of immaculate chas- 
tity. To have admitted the plain sense of the intelligi- 
ble phrase employed by the inspired evangelist, in refe- 
rence to this inconsequential point, would have been 
tantamount to a betrayal of the whole scheme of eccle- 
siastical celibacy. Only let it be granted that the virtue 
of the "mother of God" was simply real virtue^ and 
that her piety was a principle of the heart, and that her 
purity was the purity of the affections ; and only allow 
that she was a holy woman, and an exemplary w-ife and 
mother, such as the apostles speak of, and commend,, 
only to have done this, would have marred the entire 
scheme of theology and morals, as fancied, fashioned,, 
and perfected by the ancient church. I'he perpetual in- 
violateness of the blessed Virgin was well felt to be the 
key-stone of the building; or, to change the figure, 
Mary's unloosened zone was the tier of the ecclesias- 
tical dome, the rending of which would have been a uni- 
versal crash. So firm and fixed are those analogies 



OF THE AXCIENT CHURCH. 131 

which bhul systems together, when, from age to age, 
they reappear, that, by a perhaps unconscious and in- 
stinctive tendency, the modern promulgators of ancient 
Christianity are, with a significant sensitiveness, pro- 
truding this great orthodox verity, of the perpetual vir- 
ginity of the mother of God: they are just putting it 
forth, or shoving it forward in advance of their steps, 
as an indispensable preparative for their after-work, in 
church reform. Do not imagine that this point is an in- 
significant one : you will find that it touches the inti- 
mate springs of the system ; and I venture to predict, 
that, unless these good men take the alarm in time, and 
hold back a little, until they feel their success to be bet- 
ter assured, we shall hear something more than we have 
yet heard, about the " always virgin." Listen, for one 
moment, to our zealous advocate of Mary's honours ; 
and there is the more reason for doing so, because, as 
we shall find, he only echoes the voice of all antiquity, 
keeping to the quod semper, quod ubique, quod ab om- 
nibus, concerning so fundamental a principle of religion. 

"She alone," says St. Bernard, "of all born of women, 
was born without sin, and preserved sinless throughout 
her life. Well indeed did become the queen of virgins, 
this singular privilege of sanctity, to pass a life abso- 
lutely exempt from sin !" Thus, and with equal zeal 
and confidence, at least as to the " perpetual virginity," 
speak the devout Basil, the truly great Athanasius, and 
fifty others — all inwardly, if not avowedly conscious, 
thrt this article of their faith was of vital consequence 
to their system. 

" How are my eyes dazzled by the splendour of the 
diadem of our queen, which illuminates the universe . . . 
what then are the stars in this refulgent diadem — the chief 



132 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

honours of virginity, and these prerogatives — to have 
conceived without corruption — to have been gravid with- 
out burden — to have given birth without pain! . . . ." 

In fact, this Cybele of the fathers was to be consti- 
tuted a goddess, in all points, and she became, at length, 
the real and principal object of the religious sentiments 
of the (so called) Christian world. But who, let it be 
asked, were the authors of this unutterable idolatry? 
Who was it that set these blasphemies a-going?^ — not 
the popes, not the later Roman doctors ; but none other 
than the early teachers of Christianity, w^ho, having once 
assumed a false principle in religion, were thenceforward 
carried, by a latent and irresistible tendency, to adopt 
every absurd and impious notion that might favour it. I 
might, to some good purpose, detain you yet with St. 
Eernard, on whose pages, and entirely apart from his 
Romanism, we fijid expanded the gay petals of those 
buds which already show their colours in the writings 
of the early fathers. I have gathered a sample only, 
such as may serve to arrest attention, when brought into 
comparison with corresponding passages of a thousand 
years' earlier date. 

'* But now, let me ask," says St. Bernard, address- 
ing the clergy, "how do the bishops and priests of this 
our age study to preserve that sanctity of continence, in 
heart and person, w^ithout which no man shall see the 
Lord? Truly hath the Lord, in the gospel, said to 
bishops, and without doubt it was so in the primitive 
church, let your loins be girt, thereby not merely ap- 
proving but commanding chastity (celibacy) — the Holy 
Spirit this signifying, that no one should come near the 
table of the Lord, or approach that angels' food, unless 
purified in mind and body; — that is, by the observance 



I 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 13^3 

of a strict celibacy. But how do we regard this injunc- 
tion? — I think it better, on this head, to dissimulate a 
little, rather than, by speaking out, to say what might 
scandalize the innocent and uninformed. And yet why 
sliould I scruple to speak of that, which they (the bishops 
and clergy) do not blush to perpetrate? Brethren, I am 
become a fool; but ye have compelled jne." 

A passage presents itself, in this connexion, which, 
while it affords a characteristic example of the perverted 
style of applying scripture, is curious, as a conceit played 
with by writer after writer, from Tertullian to St. Ber- 
nard, and as we have seen, among others by Cyprian. 

, " I beseech you, my beloved sister, hear with all re- 
verence the word of exhortation. . . . The thirty-fold is 
the first deo^ree, and it sio^nifies the alliances of tlie mar- 
ried; the sixty-fold is the second step, and signifies the 
continence of widows; the hnndred-fold is the third step, 
in this gradation of ranks; and it intends the crown of 
chastity, destined for virgins. , . . Conjugal virtue is 
good, the virtue of widows is better; but best is the in- 
tegrity of absolute virginity. Nevertheless, better is an 
humble widow, than a haughty virgin; better a widow 
mourning her sins, than a virgin boasting of her virgi- 
nity. . . . Nor ought such to contemn, or to glory over, 
married women, living virtuously. Wlien, therefore, 
honest wives frequent the monastery, despise them not; 
they are the handmaidens of the Lord; love them as mo- 
thers. And thou, say not that thou art a dry tree, for if 
thou lovest thy S])ouse, Christ, thou liast seven sons; 
thy first-born, is modesty, thy second, patience, thy 
third, sobriety, thy fourth, temperance, thy fifth, charity, 
thy sixth, humility, thy seventh, chastity. Thus hast 
thou, my venerable sister, by the Holy Ghost, borne 

12* 



134 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

unto Christ, and without pain, seven sons; that the scrip- 
ture might be fulfilled — the' barren hath borne seven." 
Once more, and requesting you to turn to a passage al- 
ready quoted from Cyprian, take the following, which 
may suffice to show that the sentiment and style of speak- 
ing characteristic of ripened Romanism, was nothing but 
an echo of the sentiments and language of the earliest 
times; as will farther appear from other evidence I have 
to produce. 

" We come now to contemplate the lily blossom: and 
see, O thou, the virgin of Christ! see how much fairer 
is this thy flower, than any otiier! look at the special 
grace which, beyond any other flower of the earth, it 
hath obtained! Nay, listen to the commendation be- 
stowed upon it by the Spouse himself, when he saith — 
Consider the lilies of the field (the virgins) how they 
grow, and yet I say unto you that Solomon in all his 
glory, was not arrayed like one of these! Read there- 
fore, O virgin, and read again, and often read again, and 
again, this word of thy Spouse, and understand how, 
in the commendation of this flower, he commends thy 
glory! He, the all-wise Creator, and Architect of all 
things, veils all the glory of this world, just with thy 
blossom: nor only is the glory equalled by the flower; 
but he sets tlie flower above all glory. In the glory of 
Solomon you are to understand that, whatever is rich 
and great on earth, and the choicest of all, is prefigured; 
and in the bloom of thy lily, which is thy likeness, and 
that of all tlje virgins of Christ, the glory of virginity 

is intended See how, in this song of loves, the 

Spouse insists upon his fondness for thee — the lily — 
saying, as the lily among the thorns, so is my beloved 
among the daughters; and again, my beloved goes up 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 135 

to his spicy flower beds, and gathers lilies. Admirable 
lily! the love of the Spouse! lovely lily! which is ga- 
thered by the Spouse! Not truly, as I ween, is it ga- 
thered that it should wither; but that it should be laid 
upon the golden altar, which is before the eyes of the 
Lord. . . . Virginity hath indeed a two-fold prerogative, 
a virtue which, in others, is single only; for while all 
the church is virgin in soul, having neither spot, nor 
wrinkle; being incorrupt in faith, hope, and charity, on 
which account it is called a virgin, and merits the praises 
of the Spouse, what praise, think you, are our lilies 
worthy of, who possess this purity in body, as well as 
in soul, which the church at large has in soul only! In 
truth, the virgins of Christ are, as we may say, the fat 
and marrow of the church, and by right of an excellence 
altogether peculiar to themselves, they enjoy his most 
familiar embraces." 

A passage already cited from Cyprian, and a passage 
too, not cited (occurring in his treatise on the attire of 
nuns) though not so pretty, is substantially equivalent to 
this of St. Bernard; and it goes the whole length of those 
utterly improper accommodations, which, when ad- 
dressed to sickly and sensitive feminine imaginations, 
must have had a most pernicious and degrading ten- 
dency. 

So sprightly a conceit as this, was not to be hastily 
thrown aside, and we find the reverend gallant, with the 
bevy of fair ladies before him, carrying on his pleasant 
discourse much farther than we have, at present, either 
leisure or inclination to follow him. We shall soon see 
in what style the hot and crabbed TertuUian handles si- 
milar topics; not nearly indeed so much in the mode of 
the rosy-lipped, and scented petit maitre, but yet so as 



^*- 



136 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

to include all the substance of the same system of per- 
verted theology, and of miserably corrupt morality. 

But before adducing my next set of evidences, I re- 
quest you again to notice the instances contained in the 
above quotations, of what I have called the usurping of 
scripture, and which is tlie general characteristic of the 
early Christian divines — that is, the taking texts in spe- 
cial senses, not simply in the way of misapplication (a 
fault that has been too common in all ages) but restrict- 
ing a passage which manifestly bears a broad meaning, 
to some technical purpose; thus robbing the church at 
large of its portion; as in an instance above cited, where, 
whatever is said concerning instruction and correction, 
is made to mean — the discipline of the monastery: or 
when, as we find in St. Bernard, purity and sanctity are 
made to mean — virginity, and an artificial abjuration of 
the social relationships. Now you may be charitably 
willing to believe that this was nothing worse that an 
incidental error of practice, in the interpretation of scrip- 
ture. For my own part, meeting with it, as I do, every 
where, or nearly so, in the remains of Christian an- 
tiquity; and especially in connexion with the supersti- 
tions of the early church, I regard it as the natural re- 
sult, and the inevitable concomitant, of the adoption of a 
grand false principle in religion, the support of which 
absolutely demanded, at every turn, some such introver- 
sion of the plain meaning of the inspired writers. But 
this is a subject of such prime significance, as that it 
will ask to be more fully considered herealter. 

I am now to bring forward the most vigorous, as well 
as one of the earliest of the Christian writers, and the 
contemporary of men who had converspd with the im- 
mediate successors of the apostles. 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 137 

Tertiilliaii, in the first of his epistles to his wife, dis- 
suading her from contracting a second marriage, in the 
event of his death (a curious affair altogether) says — 
*' against all (specious reasons of a contrary tendency, 
and which he had enumerated) employ the example of 
OUR SISTERS (the dedicated virgins) whose names are with 
the Lord — penes Dominum (enrolled as nuns in the 
church books) and who place sanctity (that is to say, 
virginity) above all considerations of beauty or of youth, 
which might induce them to marry: they had rather be 
married to the Lord; in his eyes fair, on him they wait 
as his handmaids, with him they live; with him they 
converse ; him, night and day they handle (tractant;) 
their prayers, as their dowry, they render to him, and 
from him, as pin money, they receive, from time, to 
time, whatsoever they desire. Thus have ihey now an- 
ticipated that eternal good which is the gift of the Lord, 
and thus, while on earth, in not marrying, they are reck- 
oned as belonging to the angelic household. By 
using the example of women, such as these, you will 
incite, in yourself, an emulation of their continence, 
and by the spiritual taste break down carnal affections, 
freeing your soul from the stains of the transitory de- 
sires belonging to youth and beauty, by the thought of 
the recompense of immortal benefits." 

You will observe in this passage first, the clear re- 
ference to the established custom, at this early time, of 
vowing perpetual virginity; and then, that identity of 
principle, and analogy of sentiment, and even corre- 
spondence in terms, which all serve to support ray pro- 
position, That this principal element of ancient Chris- 
tianity, was as fully developed, or nearly so, in the se- 
.<;ond and third century, as in the thirteenth. In what 



138 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

follows you will readily distinguish the extravagance of 
Tertullian's personal opinions, from those generally ad- 
mitted notions, on the ground of which he argues in ad- 
dressing others. It is with the latter, not the former, 
that we are at present concerned. In the passage to be 
cited, our author gives the clue (which may indeed else- 
where be found clearly enough, and of which, hereafter, 
I must make some use) to the institution of celibacy, as 
a permanent order in the church. Satan had his de- 
voted widows, and his virgin priestesses, and should not 
Christ have the like? The Vv^eil-known heathen prac- 
tices, in this respect, were looked upon with a sort of 
jealousy, by the ill-judging leaders of the church, who 
deemed it a point of honour, not to be outdone in any 
extravagant act or practice of devotion, by the gentiles, 
over whom they might have been content to claim the 
genuine superiority of real virtue. The same fatal am- 
bition, as we shall see hereafter, operated as a principal 
means of perverting the ritual and system of worship, 
and of spoiling, in all its parts, the simplicity of the 
gospel. 

" Among the heathen," says Tertullian, " a strictness 
of discipline, in this respect, is observed, which ours do 
not submit to. But these restraints the devil imposes on 
his servants, and he is obeyed ; and hereby stimulates 
the servants of God to reach an equal virtue. The priests 
of gehenna retain their continence; for the devil knows 
how to destroy men, even in the practice of the virtues; 
and he cares not, so that he does but slay tliem, whether 
it be by the indulgence of the flesh, or by mortifying it." 

Well would it have been for the church, had this dou- 
ble dealing of the adversary been thoroughly understood, 
and so those devices resisted, which were as fatal to the 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 139 

serious and fervent as the common baits of sensuality 
are to the mass of mankind ! A false principle once as- 
sumed, under strong excitements, has the power to in- 
fatuate even the strongest and the best informed minds, 
and to lead them to any extent of extravagance. Thus 
we find our author, having firmly attached himself to 
the then prevalent belief, that there could be no virtue ot 
purity, worth the name, apart from celibacy; or, in other 
words, that even the lawful matrimonial connexion was, 
in some degree, of the nature of vice ; or was, as some 
of them did not scruple to term it, stuprum conjugale, 
goes about, with a perverse ingenuity, to prove that God 
had, under the new dispensation of grace, actually re- 
scinded the constitutions of nature. This instance of 
audacious exposition is really remarkable. 

. . . '' The command— Increase and multiply, is abo- 
lished. Yet, as I think (contrary to the gnostic opinion) 
this command, in the first instance, and now the removal 
of it, are from one and the same God ; who then, and 
in that early seed-time of the human race, gave the reins 
to the marrying principle, until the world should be re- 
plenished, and until he had prepared the elements of a 
new scheme of discipline. But now, in this conclusion 
of the ages, he restrains what once he had let loose, and 
revokes what he had permitted. The same reason go- 
verns the continuance, at first, of that which is to pre- 
pare for the future. In a thousand instances, indulgence 
is granted to the beginnings of things. So it is that a 
man plants a wood, and allows it to grow, intending, in 
due time, to use the axe. The wood, then, is the old 
dispensation, which is done away by the gospel, in 
which the axe is laid to the root of the tree." 

Had Tertullian never read our Lord's solemn re-an- 
nouncement of the ©Id law-—'* wherefore a man shall 



140 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

leave," &c., or Paul's assertion of the apostolic liberty, 
to *' lead about a wife," or his injunction that the minis- 
ters of religion should be husbands? But all this took 
no hold of his mind, inasmuch as he, and the church of 
his time, had thoroughly substituted for the genuine idea 
of virtue and purity, an artificial and unnatural institute^ 
having its gradations of excellence, the topmost glory 
being claimed for the Lord's spotless nuns! Thus was 
the form of godliness zealously cared for, while the sub- 
stance of it was forgotten. 

*' May it not suffice thee to have fallen from that high 
rank of immaculate virginity, by once marrying, and so 
descending to a second stage of honour? Must thou yet 
fall farther; even to a third, to a fourth,^ and, perhaps, 
yet lower?" .... 

It was the inevitable consequence (a consequence 
which, in fact, instantly followed) of the notion that 
celibacy was a high merit, and matrimony a defilement 
and a discredit, that this peculiar advantage should at- 
tach to the ministers of religion: the natural inference is 
expressly pointed out by most of the early writers; and 
thus it came about that the Lord's appointment, declared 
in so many words, was nullified by the absurd and im- 
pious inventions of men. Very early the married clergy 
were regarded as a degraded class, insulted by their ar- 
rogant, and often profligate, or, at least, fanatical col- 
leagues, and held in no esteem by the people. Of what 
avail is it, then, to inquire at what date, precisely, the 
celibacy of the clergy was authoritatively enjoined, as if 
we wished to make good an impeachment of the papal 
power? This injunction, and the enforcement of it, 
ought rather to be regarded as acts of mercy, than as 
instances of tyranny; so long as the ancient principle of 
the merit of celibacy was to be maintained. Fof, in faeiy 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH, 141 

submission to a universally imposed law is far easier 
than a compliance with a variable custom, or prejudice, 
which may be broken through. Under painful condi- 
tions of any kind, the mind much sooner acquiesces in 
a stern, irrevocable rule, than in a partial and often re- 
laxed usage. Besides, the enforcement of celibacy re- 
moved, at once, the invidious distinction that had ob- 
tained between the married and the unmarried clergy; and 
it set the seculars, at least, all on one level. It was an 
act of mercy, therefore, quite as much as of severity; 
and, for ourselves, we must not be so inequitable as to 
throw the blame upon popery. Who was it, but the 
doctors of the pristine church, that have made themselves 
answerable for the corruptions and the miseries, the tears, 
the agonies of remorse, the perversions of nature, the 
debaucheries, the cruellies, that have directly resulted 
from the celibacy of the clergy, through a long course 
of ages (not to include, now, the monkish institutions) 
who bul the sincere and devout, many of them, but 
deplorably mistaken, men that are now quoted as our 
masters in Christian etiiics and theology? 

But I have not quite done with Tertullian. The legal 
education and dialectic habits of this writer, as well as 
his natural sagacity, made him perceive more clearly, 
and, perhaps, sooner than others, that practices such as 
those involved in the discipline and order of celibacy 
could not be maintained, or enforced, even after perverse 
ingenuity and exorbitant rhetoric had done their ut- 
most, in the way of exaggeration, without the aid of 
some general principle, such as should bear any weigh* 
that might be thrown upon it, and which the scriptures 
could not be made to sustain. We, therefore, find bin* 
very deliberately going to work to lay this necessary 

13 



142 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

foundation, whereon might be reared, and whereon, in 
fact, has been reared, a vast and ever-growing super- 
structure of superstition, human devices, and tyrannous 
canons. 

In commencing the present argument with the subject 
of the ancient doctrine concerning virginity, I have felt 
that it would open to us the most accessible, and the 
most direct path, to the principle which is really at issue 
between the favourers of antiquity and their opponents; 
and I think you will admit, in the end, that I have not 
taken up the wrong clue. In the treatise concerning the 
veiling of nuns — by the way, do not startle at the term 
as employed by a writer of the pristine age, for at this 
time the word virgo had, among church writers, already 
acquired its technical sense, and, in fact, conveyed ail 
the meaning afterwards attached to the more peculiar 
epithet nonna; in this elaborate treatise, in vi^hich all 
the subtleties of a special pleader are exhausted upon a 
theme utterly frivolous, TertuUian, at the outset, having 
laid down the immoveahle principles of faith, as summa- 
rily expressed in the apostles' creed, affirms that what 
affects discipline and Christian behaviour, must admit 
perpetual correction (or alteration) even to the end of 
time; as it were to adapt the Christian scheme to the in 
cessant opposite agency of the devil. " Wherefore it is 
that the Lord hath sent the Comforter, that, as the fee- 
bleness of human nature could not at once receive the 
whole truth, it might, by degrees, be directed and regu- 
lated, and led on, until the system of discipline had 
reached perfection, under the vicarious influence of the 
Holy Spirit of the Lord (ab illo vicario Domini Spiritu 
sancto.) "I have many things yet to say unto you," 
saith he, *' but ye cannot sustain them at present: but 
when He, the Spirit of truth is come, he will lead yotf 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 143 

into all truth, and will declare to you things that are ta 
be superadded," (supervenientia, instead of quae venturae 
sunt) — concerning which office (of the Spirit) he had 
above spoken. What, then, is this administration of 
the Comforter, unless it consist in such things as these 
— that matters of discipline be ordered, that the (sense 
of the) scriptures be opened, that the mind (of the 
church) be restored, and that it should be advanced to- 
ward what is better? There is nothing that does not 
advance by age. All things wait upon time, as the 
preacher saith, there is a time for every thing. Look 
at the natural world, and see the plant gradually ripen- 
ing to its fruit, first a mere grain; from the grain arises 
the green stalk, and from the stalk shoots up the shrub; 
then the boughs and branches get strength, and the tree 
is complete: thence the swelling bud; and from the bud, 
the blossom; and from the flower the fruit; which, at the 
first crude and shapeless, by little and little proceeds, 
and attains its ripe softness and flavour. And so in re- 
ligion, (justitia,) for it is the same God of nature, and of 
religion: at first in its rudiments only, nature surmising 
something concerning God; then by the law and the 
prophets advanced to its infant state; then by the gospel 
it reached the heats of youth ; and now, by the Com- 
forter, is moulded to its maturity." 

In the tract, De Corona, in a passage which has of 
late been several times quoted, and to which I must 
hereafter revert, Tertullian expounds the same principle ; 
but farther on, in the same, after going through with his 
argument on the grounds of nature, scripture, and custom, 
or the established discipline of the apostolic churches, 
our author proceeds, " Scripture is of God, nature is of 
God, discipline (usage) is of God ; and whatever con- 
tradicts these is not of God. If in any case scripture: 



144 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

be ambiguous, nature is indubitable, and, sustained by 
its testimony, scripture cannot be uncertain ; or if there 
were yet any doubt concerning the evidence of nature, 
the discipline, (usage of the churches) which is more 
directly authenticated by God, shows the way." 

With a more important purpose in hand, I refrain 
from quoting the amusing peroration of this tract. Let 
us pause then a moment upon the passage quoted, which 
£0 appositely concludes the citations already made, un- 
der this head of my argument. We have seen, not 
merely the fact attested, of the early existence of the 
institution of celibacy, as a standing and prominent part 
of the ecclesiastical system, but have heard the cha- 
rracteristic sentiments, and the artificial notions which 
were the strength of this institution, advanced as expli- 
citly by early, as by later writers; and now we find the 
broad principle formally assumed, and asserted, which 
might not merely underprop the discipline of celibacy, 
but sustain all other additions to the Christianity of the 
scriptures, and in fact give solidity to whatever consti- 
tutes the mass of abominations summarily called, popery. 

Is then Tertullian's doctrine — his fundamental church 
axiom, a good one? Is it true, or not, that Christianity, 
as revealed and verbally expressed in the canonical 
writings, is a mere sketch, or rough draft, of that mature 
truth, which, by little and little, was to be granted to 
the church, through the medium of its doctors, and un- 
der the guidance of the Holy Spirit? If so, then is 
there any where else we can look for the progressive 
expansion of this ever-growing truth, but to the church 
of Rome; or, if we like it better, the Greek church? 
Where is the tree to be found, laden with its fruit, but 
where the plant was set? At this rate, protestantism, 
under whatever pretext, is nothing better than a multifa- 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 145 

rious blasphemy, and a high sin against the Holy Ghost: 
and what have its martyrs been, but the justly punished 
enemies of God and the church? 

If TertuUian's principle of a slow development of 
truth be sound, then every separate item of the Romish 
superstitions and encroachments, was really a new fa- 
vour» granted to the church from above ; — or if not, or 
if there are any exceptions, who shall come in, and 
name these exceptions, or enable us to distinguish be- 
tween the genuine, and the spurious developments of the 
great scheme? At this rate, the enormities of the mo- 
nastic institution, and the compulsory celibacy of the 
clergy, the superstition of relics, the invocation of saints, 
the communion in one kind, the mass in Latin, the uni- 
versal vicarship of the bishop of Rome, the secular 
powers w^ielded by the church, and — the denial of the 
scriptures to the laity, are all so many boons, graciously 
sent down from on high, as parts and parcels of that 
adult symmetry which is at length to be the glory of the 
mature church. But who shall say why, if this princi- 
ple be assumed, we should make a stand at tridentine 
Romanism ? Has the Spirit withdrawn from the church; 
has the promise of the Lord been revoked; are the fa- 
vours of heaven exhausted; are there yet no truths in 
reserve; is the treasury of divine elements so soon 
emptied ? — on the contrary, we ought to be looking 
every day for some farther apocalypse, some new and 
lieaven-born institute, or practice : nay, it is only pious 
to believe, that the progressive manifestation shall go on, 
until the vast discrepancy between tlie ripened Chris- 
lia]uty of a remote age, and its rude commencement, 
as consigned to the canonical writings, shall utterly dis- 
miss these as obsolete and void. It is thus, in fact, that 

13^ 



146 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

the church, after she had made so much progress in ad- 
vance of her first position, as to render the contrast be- 
tween herself and scriptural Christianity a matter of scan- 
dal to the simple, wisely (and indeed of necessity) inter- 
dicted the perusal of the Bible; nor can she be accused, in 
this instance, and if her principle be good, of having 
deprived the people of any real or important benefit; for 
why should we wish to revert from a more perfect, to a 
less perfect exhibition of the divine mind? To look to 
the scriptures, instead of looking to the church of our own 
times, is as if those under the theocratic dispensation, 
had, in contempt of their prerogatives, relapsed to natu- 
ral religion; or as if the first Christians had sought to 
reinstate Judaism. 

Ycu must not think that, in all this, I either exagge- 
rate the consequences of the doctrine in question, or be- 
stow upon it more regard than it deserves. Nothing 
can be more clear or direct than is the inference, as it 
flows from the premises, nor do I know that the essence 
of the argument with which at the present moment we are 
concerned, can be much less exceptionably stated than it 
is by TertiiUian, in the passage I have quoted. Was 
Christianity complete and mature in the hands of the 
apostles, or was it then in the bud merely, waiting to be 
expanded and ripened by the suns and showers of marty 
centuries? If we assume the former position, and deny 
altogether Tertullian's doctrine, then we must not only 
reject popery and its usurpations, but the immemorial 
errors also of ancient Christianity. 

1 do not forget that, in reference to the above-cited 
principle, it would be easy to refute Tertullian — out of 
Tertullian, (a mode of treatment to which every intem- 
perate and wayward writer is open) for when he under- 
takes to deal with heretics, and feels that he must have 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 147 

ground to stand upon that will afford him support in 
overturning their foolish novelties, he ^'^ prescribes''^ 
them with stringent references to the unchanging autho- 
rity of scripture, as sustained by the continuous and 
concurrent testimony of the apostolic churches. But 
then, mark the predicament in which we stand. — If we 
are compelled to make a choice between the two Ter- 
tullians, considered as the champions of the notions and 
practices of the church at that time, it must be the writer 
of the passage above cited, not the more sound divine 
whom we find trampling upon the crew of heretics, that 
will serve our purpose. The protest ant Tertullian may 
indeed be the most to our taste of the two; but then he 
condemns, by a clear implication, all the most favourite 
practices of that early age. It is, therefore, the triden- 
tine Tertullian of whose rhetoric we must avail ourselves, 
for the defence of those articles of ancient Christianity 
which some are now fondly admiring, and would fain 
restore. 

It is thus too with Vincent of Lerins, so often quoted of 
late. None better than he, bars the church door against 
heretics, or the broachers of new doctrines; but then, 
unforiunaiely, as in some cases, the bar of a door is 
found to be the most potent instrument one can lay 
hands upon, to employ as a croiv^ or lever, for breaking it 
open, so are the densely compacted paragraphs of the 
cogent Vincent, convertible, in the readiest manner, to 
the purpose of demolishing, not merely Romanism, but 
the superstitious Christianity of the eastern, and of the 
western clmrches, such as it was in the writer's times. 
Give us but that excellent tract, the Commonitorium, 
and we might defy, single-handed, all the Beliarmines 
of the papacy, and all the fathers; and, with due 
modesty be it spoken, the entire band of the Oxford 



148 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

Tract writers. But of this more perhaps in another 
place. 

The often-repeated opinions to which my first propo- 
sition stands opposed, would, if correct, justify the ex- 
pectation that, in taking so long a period as four or five 
hundred years, any where out of the sixteen hundred pre- 
ceding the reformation, one should be able, without any 
ambiguity, to trace the progress of religious corruption, 
and that it would be easy to sav — such and such false 
notions, or extravagant sentiments, are characteristic of 
the later time, from which errors tlie earlier age is al- 
together exempt: but in reference to the subject now 
before us (and I think not to this" alone) such an expec- 
tation is by no means borne out by the evidence. I 
must profess to be entirely unable to draw any line of 
very obvious distinction, marking the advances of folly, 
error, or corruption, in this particular, during the lapse 
of fourteen centuries. Some writers, it is true, such as 
Gregory the Great, or Palladius, are much more extra- 
vagant than some others, on this point; but then this dif- 
ference attaches to the individual, and has no reference 
whatever to the place he occupies, chronologically, in 
the series. 

To render our notions, in this instance, as definite as 
possible, I would look at the subject in difi^erent lights, 
and, in doing so, 1 find only one respect in which the 
influence of time is clearly to be traced, in rendering the 
doctrine and practice of religious celibacy of a later age 
unlike what it had been at an earlier time; and this, 
which 1 have ah'eady alluded to, relates to those purelv 
ecclesiastical enactments, and points oi' discioliiie, which, 
from time to time, were found to be indispensable, as 
corrective of the abuses whereto the entire system was 
pbnoxious. These changes, or amendments, it would 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 149 

serve no purpose whatever, as related to our present ar- 
gument, to specify. Let it be remembered, however, 
that, although they may have implied some stretches of 
tyranny, they are not, generally, of the nature of pro- 
gressive corruptions. 

In every other respect, time made nothing essentially 
worse than it had been almost from the first. To come 
to instances : — if we are thinking of those abject and 
frivolous observances that have attached to the monastic 
modes of life, and to the devotional routine of the mo- 
nastery, I would request any who may be inclined to 
demur at my representations, to compare whatever de- 
scriptions he may choose to select of the mummeries of 
the monasticism of the twelfth century, with the Insti- 
tutes of Cassian, which contain the principles and the 
minute details of the monastic institution, *as it had al- 
ready been digested, and then long practised, in the 
east, and the west, so early as the fourth century. There 
may be variations^ distinguishing the two schemes of 
life ; but will a reasonable man affirm that there is any 
thing to choose or to prefer in the more ancient model? 
There is no degradation of the intellect, no bondage of 
the moral sentiments, no fatal substitution of forms for 
realities; there is no ineffable drivelling belonging to the 
middle age monkery, that may not be matched, to the 
full, in the monkery of the bright times of Chrysostom, 
Ambrose, and Augustine. I here put the question aloud, 
to any opponent — '' What is it that you precisely mean 
by the corruptions of popery, in respect to the monastic 
system?" or, in other words, " can you make it appear, 
to the satisfaction of thinking men, that this same sys- 
tem had become more frivolous, and therefore, in a re- 
ligious sense, more pernicious, in the twelfth century, 
than it was at the opening of the fourth?" I am tempted 



150 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

here to cite the very words of Cassian, who, in stickling, 
/with great seriousness, for some inanity of the monkish 
daily ritual, says, . . . qui modus antiquitus constitutus, 
idcirco per tot saecula penes cuncta monasteria intemera- 
tus nunc usque perdu rat; quid non humana adinventione 
statutus a senioribus affirmatur, sed coslitus angeli ma- 
gisterio patribus fuisse delatus. These observances then 
could have been no novelties. 

But again ; if we think of those enormous follies and 
impious whims, which, connected as they always were 
with the monastic life, imposed a mask, sometimes of 
idiotcy, and sometimes of madness, upon the bright face 
of Christianity, I ask whether this sort of corruption 
was more extreme in a later age, than it had been in au 
earlier; or, if any think so, I would send them no far- 
ther than to the Lausaic history of the pious and really 
respectable Palladius, a bishop, a man of some learning, 
and the intimate friend of the illustrious Chrysostom, 
and the companion of his exile. I am not about to cite 
any samples of the utter nonsense and the spiritual ri- 
baldry of this book. Let those refer to it, and satisfy 
themselves, who are still, clinging to the fond idea of a 
golden age of Christianity. The legends, collected by 
Palladius, relate, for the most part, to an earlier age than 
his own ; and romances of like quality are to be found 
in Eusebius, Sozomen, and Theodoret, as well as Ma- 
carius, and as belonging to the times of the heathen per- 
secutions. No one, I am sure, who really knows what 
he is talking about, will dare, with such documents be- 
fore him, to play the Quixote, and break a lance in de- 
fence of the honour of the ancient monkery. 

Or, if we were to make inquiry concerning the half- 
confessed, and yet sufTiciendy attested serious evils and 
horrors that have disgraced the institute of religious ce- 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 151 

libacy, I think that those who have been used to look 
into the fathers will admit there to be reason enough for 
believing that the natural and inevitable consequences of 
this institute, v/hen once it came to include promiscuous 
masses of the religious body, developed themselves fully 
from the very first. On this point, I will neither make 
references, nor put the clue into any one's hand; but 
leave my broad assertion to be contradicted by those 
who may think it safe and discreet to dare me to the 
proof. One hint only I will drop: and must do so in an- 
ticipation of what it would give me no surprise (what- 
ever disgust) to witness: I mean a gentle, sentimental, 
plausible endeavour, to feel the religious pulse, in refe- 
rence to the "celestial and apostolic'^ practice of " vow- 
ing virginity to the Lord." In any such case there would 
be no room for compromise, or half measures; but evi- 
dence must be instantly spread out before all eyes, show- 
ing what have, in every age, and from the first, been the 
deplorable consequences of this pernicious custom. Some 
may smile at the mere supposition that any such endea- 
vour should be made — out of the pale of the Romish 
communion. For my own part (unless I may have had 
the honour of suggesting a little caution to certain par- 
ties) it is nothing but what I think we are to look for, as 
the next move in the game. 

There yet remains, however, one other point of view, 
whence the same subject may be regarded, and that is 
the bearing of the institute of celibacy upon the religious 
principle, which was appealed to for giving it support: 
now, without anticipating what will more properly find 
a place, a little way on, I will state the fact, that, at a 
very early time, a false maxim of spiritual computation 
had become so inveterate, as that the most sedate and 
judicious divines, without hesitation, employ it, in the 



152 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

estimates they form of the comparative excellence of 
different religious conditions. That is to say, a rule of 
spiritual eminence is appealed to, which discards, or 
overlooks all reference to what is truly spiritual, or, in 
any genuine sense, moral; and puts in its room what is 
formal, visible, or ecclesiastical. I will refer, in this 
instance, to the sober-minded Isidore of Pellusium, also 
a bishop, and the personal friend of Chrysostom, and 
whose expositions of scripture are frequently such as to 
deserve respectful attention. We have seen in what way 
Tertullian, Cyprian, and, with not more absurdity, St. 
Bernard, pervert the plain sense of scripture, for the 
purpose of hitching the virgins of Christ upon the lofti- 
est pinnacle of the ecclesiastical structure. Now for Isi- 
dore, who, to do him justice, inserts a frequent ctTrA-yt, 
when there appears to be a danger lest, in his recom- 
mendation of celibacy, matrimony should be despoiled 
of its due honours. 

*' The warfare of virginity is indeed great, glorious, 
and divine; yet does it, (when successfully waged,) di- 
minish the arduousness of our conflict with other of our 
spiritual adversaries .... as high as the heaven is above 
the earth, and as far as the soul excels the body, so does 
the stale of virginity surpass the state of matrimony .... 
Wherefore let the contemners of virginity cease their 
prating, and henceforward acknowledge, dutifully, its 
princess-like dignity, and submit themselves to its be- 
hests; placing themselves under its protection, and avail- 
ing themselves of its mediatorial (or intercessory) oflice. 
And (if I may employ celestial emblems) I must com- 
pare those who embrace the virgin state, to the sunj 
while those who only observe continence, are to be 
likened to tlie moon; and those living in honourable wed- 
lock, to the stars; and so, as the divine Paul reckons up 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 15^ 

the degrees of dignity, and says — there is one glory of 
the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another 
glory of the stars !" 

Now, it is no matter to us, whether Isidore is right or 
wrong in the relative position which he assigns to the 
three estates; but it is of real importance, and important 
to our present argument, to observe the fact that, so ut- 
terly fallacious and fatally erroneous a principle of reli- 
gious feeling had, at this time, come to be universally 
received, and admitted, by even the most judicious di- 
vines; and that, in accordance with this principle, the 
piety and purity of the heart had come to be subordi- 
nated to the visible and ecclesiastical condition, and that 
continence was regarded as mere moonshine, when 
placed in the same heavens with the solar effulgence of 
the virginity of the nun. Mean time, whatever might be 
the personal godliness, or the purity, or the solid virtues 
of the Christian matron, all were, at the best, but the 
faint twinkling of a star! Now, as it seems to me, all 
this is not mere rodomontade, which one may smile at, 
and let pass, but it is substantially false doctrine, and of 
most putrid quality, in regard to piety and morals: it is 
the indication of an ulcer — a bad condition of the vitals 
of the Christian system, and a condition which had then 
become inveterate. Isidore's theology is not poperyf 
nor was it his own scheme of doctrine; but the inheri- 
tance which he had come into: it was the boasted apos- 
tolic catholicity, which all his contemporaries had as- 
sented to, and which was scrupulously watched over, 
and handed down, to the next age. If Gregory I. may 
fairly be regarded as the father of popery^ using the term 
in its proper sense, I am sure he does not, on the point 
now before us, advance any thing which may not find 

U 



154 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

its parallel on the pages of the best writers of the fourth 
century: but the proof of this assertion cannot be ne- 
cessary to my immediate argument. 

I shall then on the whole assume as not to be denied, 
the general affirmation imbodied in my first proposition. 
That the lapse of many centuries exhibits no essential 
change, or progression, in reference to the principles, 
the practices, or the abuses of religious celibacy. 



THE SECOND PROPOSITION. 

I HAVE undertaken to adduce proof of the assertion, 
not only that the doctrine of the merit of celibacy, and 
the consequent practices, are found in a mature state at 
an early age; but also — 

That, at the earliest period at which we find this doc- 
trine and these practices distinctly mentioned, they are 
referred to in such a manner as to make it certain that 
they were, at thatj time, no novelties, or recent innova- 
tions. 

Now I am aware that a statement such as this, if it 
shall appear to be borne out by evidence, will excite 
alarm in some minds; The dissipation of erroneous irH- 
pressions, is always a critical and somewhat perilous 
operation; nevertheless dangers much more to be feared, 
are incurred by a refusal to admit the full and simple 
truth. Yet the alarm that may be felt in this instance, 
at the first, may soon be removed; for although it were 
to appear that certain capital errors of feelings and prac- 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 155 

tice, had seized the church universal, at the very mo- 
ment when the personal influence of the apostles was 
withdrawn, yet such an admission will shake no princi- 
ple really important to our faith or comfort. In fact, too 
many have been attaching their faith and comfort to a 
supposition, concerning pristine Christianity, which is 
totally illusory, and such as can bear no examination — 
a supposition which must long ago have been dispelled 
from all well-informed minds, by the influence of rational 
modes of dealing with historical materials, if it had not 
been for the conservative accident, that the materials, 
which belong to this particular department of history, 
have lain imbedded in repulsive folios of Latin and Greek, 
to which very few, and those not the most independent, 
or energetic in their habits of mind, have had access. 
Certain utterly unfounded generalities, very delightful 
had they possessed the recommendation of truth, have 
been a thousand times repeated, and seldom scrutinized. 

But the times of this ignorance is now passing away: 
and I think the zeal of the Oxford writers will have the 
effect, as an indirect means, of disabusing efl'ectively, 
and for ever, the religious mind, in this country, and 
perhaps throughout Europe, of the inveterate illusions 
that have so long hung over the fields of Christian anti- 
quity. It will be utterly impossible, much longer, to 
make those things believed which we have been taught 
to consider as unquestionable; and the result must be, 
(how desirable a result) the compelling the Christian 
church, henceforward, to rest its faith and practice on the 
only solid foundation. 

The actual impression, moral and spiritual, made 
upon the Jewish and pagan world by the preaching of 
the apostles themselves, and of their personal colleagues, 
has, I fear, been somewhat overrated by the generality 



156 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

of Christians ; and yet, if it be so, and if we are called 
upon to surrender a portion of our too hastily assumed 
belief, on this subject, we directly gain a proportionate 
enhancement of the collateral argument which proves the 
divine origin of Christianity, from the fact of its spread, 
and its eventual triumph, overall opposition; for the 
less it was, morally and spiritually, in its commence- 
ment, the stronger is the inference to be derived from its 
steady advances. 

And then, as to the period immediately following the 
death of the apostles, and of the men whom they per- 
sonally appointed to govern the churches, we have too 
easily, and without any sufficient evidence, assumed the 
belief that a brightness and purity belonged to it, only a 
shade or two less than what we have attributed to the 
apostolic times. This belief, is, in fact, merely the cor- 
relative of the common protestant notion concerning the 
progressive corruptions of popery, it being a natural 
supposition that the higher we ascend toward the apos- 
tolic age, so much the more truth, simplicity, purity, 
must tiiere have been in the church. Thus it is that we 
have allowed ourselves to theorize, when what we should 
have done, was simply to examine our documents. 

The opinion that has forced itself upon my own mind, 
is to this effect, that the period dating its commencement 
from the death of the last of the apostles, or apostolic 
men, was, altogether, as little deserving to be selected 
and proposed as a pattern, as any one of the first five 
of church history; — it had indeed its single points of ex- 
cellence, and of a high order, but by no means shone 
in those consistent and exemplary qualities which should 
entitle it to the honour of being considered as a model 
to after ages. We need therefore neither feel surprise 
nor alarm, when we find, in particular instances, that 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 157 

the grossest errors of theory and practice, are to be traced 
to their origin in the first century. In such instances, 
for my own part, I can wonder at nothing but the infa- 
tuation of those who, fully informed as they must be of 
the actual facts, and benefited moreover by modern 
modes of thinking, can nevertheless so prostrate their 
understandings before the phantom — venerable antiquity, 
as to be inflamed with the desire of inducing the Chris- 
tian world to imitate what really asks for apology and 
extenuation. Any such endeavour must, however, ine- 
vitably fail ; nor can it be for more than a moment, after 
once the subject has attracted general attention, that an 
illusion, so fantastic, can hold the minds of any except 
a very few, who are constitutionally disposed to admit 
it. When the bubble bursts, let the promoters of ancient 
principles look to it, that they are provided with some 
other means of keeping their doctrines in credit; and I 
am far from assuming that the general doctrines of the 
Oxford writers w^ill disappear along with the ill-founded 
prejudice they have laboured to support in favour of 
ancient Christianity. 

The actual origination of the Christian doctrine and 
practice concerning religious celibacy may, I think, be 
very satisfactorily laid open; but 'it would carry us too 
far from our more immediate object to pursue this sub- 
ject; all that I am now concerned with is the fact, that 
an error which, as I shall be able to show, affected every 
element of the theological and ecclesiastical system, had 
acquired the stability which time only can confer, at the 
earliest period when the references to it are explicit and 
ample. 

I am unwilling to tire you with Tertullian, or other- 
wise might properly bring him forward again, as a wit- 

14* 



158 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

ness, under this second head of my argument. Suffice 
it then to remind you, that, liow extravagant soever may 
have been the opinions which he adopted, concerning 
the unlawfuhiess of second marriages, and their ex- 
treme impropriety in the case of the clergy, the princi- 
ples he assumes, and on which he reasons, as admitted 
on all hands, imply nothing less than that, within little 
more than one hundred years after the death of St. John, 
an obloquy had come to be attached, in the minds of 
Christians generally, to the matrimonial connexion, as if 
it involved a degree of impurity, and rendered a man 
less fit to officiate as a priest, or, as the notion was, as 
a mediator between God, and the herd of Christians. 
It is also certain that, as a consequence of these prevail- 
ing notions, a voluntary abjuration of the sexual relation- 
ship had come to be considered as highly meritorious- 
next to martyrdom; and farther, that, in imitation of the 
analogous pagan institutes, an order of dedicated virgins 
had been established, and that these constituted a dis- 
tinct band, or choir, a grex segregatus, in the church;— 
to what good purpose let Cyprian say. 

Digamus tinguis? Digamus oilers? asks the indignant 
Tertullian; *' shall one who has contracted a second mar- 
riage baptize; or shall such a one make the eucharistic 
oblation?" Now let us coolly consider how much is in- 
volved, as found in a writer of so early an age, in a 
question such as this: — for it plainly implies the concur- 
rence of the Christian community in certain feelings — 
such as that of a false sensitiveness, in regard to exterior 
purity, and a superstitious feeling toward the sacraments, 
as if they demanded in the administrator, certain per- 
sonal qualities, or exemptions, which might be dispensed 
with in those who conducted the ordinary offices of wor- 
ship; and a belief too that degrees of spiritual merits 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 159 

were attached to degrees of separation from the ordinary 
relationships of life. From such notions, generally pre* 
vailing, nothing could in the end result but what we tind 
actually to have resulted, namely — the monastic institute 
— the enforced celibacy of the clergy, and the supersti- 
tion of the sacraments. But I now fix upon the mere 
fact, that such notions had already gained the authenti* 
cation of time, at the close of the second century. 

Looking only to the evidence furnished by TertuUian, 
we might be led to believe that the coelibate institution 
had its origin in the highly culpable ambition of the 
leaders of the church, to secure for it the glory of pos- 
sessing whatever, in the heathen system around them, 
appeared at once heroic, and capable of amalgamation 
with Christianity. Satan, it was alleged, had too long 
monopolized certain good things, which it was now high 
time to snatch from his grasp: and among these, the 
principal was the sacerdotal celibacy, enjoined upon the 
ministers of some divinities, and the consecration of the 
vestal virgins. Unhappily, this same ambition, abso- 
lutely impious as it was, took effect upon, and perverted, 
every other element of visible Ciiristianity. 

But this was not all; and if we extend our researches 
a little farther, and higher, we shall find the indications 
of the, perhaps, blameless existence of this practice, 
reaching up to the actual times of the apostles. What 
then? will it follow that, because certain individuals, who, 
from temperament, came within the meaning of our Lord's 
recommendation (Matt. xix. 12) devoted themselves to a 
single life, in order to be free from all entanglements that 
miorht withdraw them from evano^elic and charitable la- 
hours — does it follow^ that, therefore, a celestial pre-emi- 
nence should have been arrogated by, or for tiiem, or 
that shoals of young persons, without regard had to their 



160 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

individual temperament, should have been urged, in mo- 
ments of factitious excitement, to bind themselves by a 
rash vow? Here was the false step of the early church; 
a step which would never have been taken, unless, al- 
ready, the true purport of the gospel had been misunder- 
stood, and the form of godliness had been put in the 
place of the power and substance of it. 

The good Justin {second apology) in recommending 
to the imperial philosopher and persecutor, the principles 
and practices of his Christian brethren, makes it his 
boast that he could point to many, men as well as wo- 
men, who having followed the Christian institute from 
their earliest years, had remained, to an advanced age — 
sixty or seventy years, incorrupt — ctcj^Qcpo/ cT/^^gvcyo-/, un- 
married, or inviolate. These persons, then, must have so 
devoted themselves very soon after the martyrdom of 
Paul and Peter; and the practice having rapidly spread 
itself throughout the church, in all countries, and being 
at once promoted and exaggerated by the effect of perse- 
cution, soon brought it, that is to say, within the com- 
pass of another thirty or forty years, to its mature state, 
such, in fact, as we iind it in the times of Tertullian. 
In his time, as we have seen, the prevailing practice had 
generated notions palpably contradictory to the apostolic 
precepts. Paul had assumed that, ordinarily, both bishops 
and deacons were to be married men ; and he clearly 
implies that, in the exemplary discharge of the domestic 
duties, they would find the best opportunities for adorn- 
ing tlieir ministerial function. A bishop's wife, was, in 
Paul's idea, a main article in a bishop's quahfication for 
ruling tiie church of God; and a deacon's children were 
to furnish, to a deacon, the occasions for exhibiting 
the influence of Christian principles. Such was apos- 
tolic Christianity — a system of real, not of fictitious 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 161 

purity; a system of virtue and piety, adapted to the pur- 
pose of elevating and blessing man's actual condition, 
in the present state. Did there attach to the apostle's 
idea of the matrimonial connexion any, even the re- 
motest idea, of impurity, or of spiritual degradation? 
Boldly we say not the faintest supposition of moral or 
religious contamination entered his mind, in relation to 
this subject. The apostles were intent upon the esta- 
blishment, not of celibacy, but of virtue! 

Such, we say, was apostolic Christianity; but not 
such was ancient Christianity, even that of the age 
immediately following the death of the apostles. The 
difference does not reach to the mere amount of a di- 
versity of usage, or of a shade of feeling; but it involves 
nothing less than the substitution of one principle of 
virtue and piety for another. The scheme of religious 
sentiments had shifted its foundations; a different stand- 
ard of good and evil had come to be appealed to; the 
commandments of God were displaced, without scruple, 
by the whims of man; so that, wiihin so short a period 
as a hundred years, the very practices which Paul had 
solemnly commended were impiously spoken of as de- 
grading, by Tertullian, who, in this instance, only re- 
flects the general feeling of his times. 

At the present moment, the Christian community, and 
especially the clergy of the episcopal church, are called 
upon to make their choice between apostolic Christi- 
ANiTi' and ancient Christianity; and this weighty al- 
ternative must soon merge all other distinctions, leaving 
only the two parties — the adherents of the inspired, and 
those of the uninspired documents of our religion. 

But now I shall be told that I have inferred far too 
much from the \A\^g\)2.ge of the intemperate Tertullian, 
as to the sentiments of the church at large in his times. 



162 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

I am provided against this objection, and can rebut it by 
evidence altogether of another kind. 

When a question arises concerning the existence, or 
prevalence, at a particular era, of certain opinions, the 
first mode of establishing the alleged fact is that of citing 
the language of writers who explicitly profess such doc- 
trines; but then this direct evidence may be liable to a 
demur, inasmuch as it may be imagined that these writers 
are advancing nothing better than their personal notions, 
in behalf of which they are assuming much more gene- 
ral acceptance than they were entitled to claim for them. 
But even this demur is removed, when it can be shown, 
as in the instance of Tertullian, that a writer himself 
distinguishes between the common opinion and the one 
which he is labouring to promote. 

But allowing, for a moment, the pertinence of the ob- 
jection, w^e then turn to our second class of proofs, which 
consists of passages from writers who, impelled by a 
reasonable anxiety for what they consider as endangered 
truths, vigorously oppose the very opinions in question, 
as generally prevalent. 

Thus, if it were supposed (which cannot be actually 
granted, the facts being indubitable) that Tettullian, fiery 
in temper and extravagant in sentiments, had been im- 
pelled to speak of the institute of celibacy, by anticipa- 
tion, or as if it had, in his lime, received an authentica- 
tion which, in truth, was not granted to it until long 
afterward, what, then, are we to think when we find a 
writer, earlier by some years than Tertullian, and a 
man of extensive learning, who had visited the churches 
throughout the east and the west, a man, moreover, of 
singular good sense, and sobriety of judgment, such a 
writer, labouring to defend the divine institution of mat- 
rimony, against tlie swelling fanaticism of all around 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH* 163 

him? What conclusion are we to adopt when we hear 
the accomplished master of the Alexandrian school 
calmly and modestly asserting the great principles of 
nature, and of genuine piety, which he saw were likely 
to be swept away, as before a deluge of factitious ex- 
citement? The only conclusion, surely, with which 
such facts will consist, is that which my second propo- 
sition imbodies. 

After plunging in Tertullian's turbid stream, it is really 
a refreshment to walk at ease, and breathing a whole- 
some atmosphere, in the broad and pleasant garden of 
Clement of Alexandria. Some dozen of the fathers 
might be sifted, before we should get together as much 
plain good sense as may be found, within the compass 
of a few pages, in this writer. 

We have heard Tertullian's doctrine in regard to the 
gradual development of truth, from age to age; the con- 
sequence of which, if sound, is, that the Christians of 
every age owe a pious deference, not merely to the cur- 
rent orders, or the inventions of the church autiiorities 
in their own times, but to all such inventions, of pre- 
ceding times, which, in fact, as proceeding from the 
same source, are not a whit less to be regarded than the 
dictates of written revelation. The writer now before 
us holds a very different style, and, in various instances, 
manifests the sense he had of the dangerous tendency of 
the human mind in matters of religion to throw itself 
back, indolently, upon antiquity and established custom. 
On this ground, and with a manly freedom, he expostu- 
lates with the adherents of the ancient polytheism; and 
again, in those parts of his writings in which he ad- 
dresses Christians, he does an honour to the divinely- 
inspired scriptures, and dissuades from an indolent de- 
ference to usage or mere opinion, in a manner which 



164 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

distinguishes him among the church writers of his owi^ 
or of the following ages. As a remedy for that igno- 
rance which is one of the causes of vice, he knows of 
nothing but *' the convincing demonstrations of the testi- 
mony of the scripture — the written truth;" and here, 
by the way, he incidentally refers to the defection or de- 
linquencies of " multitudes of the Lord's people," in his 
times — a fact significant in relation to our general argu- 
ment. To some such he addresses himself, " not, in- 
deed to the contumacious, who spurn all instruction, 
and who, nevertheless, are more to be pitied than hated 
(a style of speaking of heretics very unlike that em- 
ployed by most of the fathers) but to those whose errors 
might be treated as remediable. Well would it have 
been," says he, '^ for some (certaiu heretics) had they 
been able to learn what was at first delivered (by the 
holy apostles and teachers in the inspired scriptures) 
instead of giving heed to human doctrines. He, there- 
fore, and he alone, inay be accounted to live aright, who, 
pursuing his course from year to year, in converse with, 
and conformity to the scriptures, keeps to the rule of the 
apostolic and ecclesiastical purity, according to the gos- 
pel and those established truths which, as given by the 
Lord, by the law, and by the prophets, whoever seeks 
shall find." 

Our learned Alexandrian, along with his contempo- 
raries, might err in particular interpretations of scrip- 
ture; but, at least, he pays homage to their sole and un- 
rivalled authority, in all matters of faith and practice: 
his errors, therefore, whatever they may be, are not 
seeds of mischief. How difl!erent is the language of 
TertuUian. Li harmony with this simple adherence to 
the inspired writings, and at the impulse of his native 
good sense, this writer treats the subject of the Christian 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 165 

use of riches, and also the rule of martyrdom, on both 
of which points, even before his time, the mass of Chris- 
tians had run into absurdities. In relation to the latter 
subject, let Clement's good sense (Strom, lib. iv.) be 
compared with the extravagance of Ignatius. The com- 
parison will afford a proof, one of many, that the calm 
reason and genuine dignity which distinguish the con- 
duct and writings of the apostles, did not attach even to 
their immediate successors. 

But we have now to cite the evidence of Clement on 
the special point in hand, and in proof of our position, 
that although a dissentient voice might be heard once in 
a century, the church at large had, from the earliest pe- 
riod to which our documents extend, admitted a perni- 
cious illusion subversive as well of morals as of pietv. 
The evidence of Clement, as I have stated, is of that 
conclusive kind which results from the struggle of a soli- 
tary sound mind, in resisting the inundation of error. I 
request you, however, especially to remember, that if, 
in some of the passages now to be adduced, the force of 
my inference might seem to be lessened by the circum- 
stance that our author is professedly contending with 
certain heretics, and not opposing himself to the general 
opinion of the church, I have at hand the instant means 
of excluding any such exception, by turning to the con- 
temporary orthodox writers, and their immediate suc- 
cessors, who go to the same length of extravagance, 
saving an impious or indecent phrase or two, which 
Clement reports as attaching to the opinions of the here- 
tics he names. I adduce him, therefore, as an unexceo- 
lionable witness to the alleged fact, that, within consi- 
derably less than a hundred years from the death of the 
last of the aposdes, the church, at large, had yielded 

15 



166 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

itself to a capital and widely extended error of senti- 
ment, practice, and theory. • 

Clement (Strom, lib. iii.) while refuting, on one side 
the prolligate, and on the other side the fanatical heretics 
of his time, employs scriptural and rational arguments, 
of which neither Cyprian, nor TertuUian, could have 
availed themselves, without condemning the system to 
which they, and the church, had pledged themselves- 
He urges, in a tone o{ "inodern good sense, and in a man- 
ner of which very few instances are to be found in the 
writings of the fathers, the general principle, that '* the 
kingdom of God is not meat and drink, or a system of 
formal and visible observances, or of servile abstinences 
from ordinary enjoyments; but righteousness and peacei 
and that it is the inner, nor the outer man, which God 
chiefly looks to." He, moreover, points it out as a cha- 
racteristic of " antichrist, and of the apostacy of the last 
limes, that there should be those who would forbid ta 
marry^ and command to abstain from meats;" and in fact 
he very nearly approaches a protestant style of remon- 
strance, against the then spreading fanaticism. It ap,- 
pears that, while the church had borrowed the institute 
of religious celibacy from the heathen v/orship, it un- 
happily availed itself of the wild errors of heretics ia 
getting up, among the people, the false excitement whence 
this institute was lo gather its victims. Clement's plain 
good sense, in asseriing the honour and sanctity of vir- 
tuous matrimony, not only contradicts the particular er- 
rors of the lieretics whom he names^ but it stands op- 
posed to that notion which, every where else, presents 
iiself, of moral or spiritual degradation, as attaching to 
that sta-e; so as that those who abjured it stood upon a 
higher platform, whence they might look down, with 
pity or scorn, upon the mass of their brethren. It was 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 167 

this very notion that was the seed of mischief, which, 
at an early period, choked the ecclesiastical field with a 
rank and poisonous vegetation. 

*' What," asks our author, '* what, may not self-com- 
mand be preserved under the conditions of married life? 
May not marriage be used, and yet continence respected, 
without our attempting to sever that which the Lord 
hath joined?" Presently afterwards he touches the prin- 
ciple of real virtue, which the church at large was then 
losing sight of, in the pursuit of a phantom. *' The 
kingdom of God is not meat and drink; and in like man- 
ner as genuine humility consists in meekness of soul, 
not in the maceration of the body; so, and in like man- 
ner (true) continence, is a virtue of the soul, and relates 
to that which is hidden (in the heart) not to the outward 
life." 

Just so much good sense and Christian truth as this, 
It is hard to meet with, in whole folios of the fathers. 
What a different story would church history have pre- 
sented, if principles so manifestly reasonable, had been 
generally regarded? But now, at a time earlier only by 
a few years than that in which we hear the fanatic Ter- 
tullian, with affected horror, putting the question — **Di- 
gamus tinguis, Digamus offers," Clement demands of 
those who would fain be holier than the Lord himself, 
whether they really mean to reprove the apostles, two 
of whom (at least) Peter and Philip, were fathers, the 
latter moreover having given his daughters in marriage; 
or Paul, who asks — " Have we not power to lead about 
a sister or wife, even as the other apostles?" Farther 
on, our author, and with much copiousness, offers a 
eulogium of woman — woman > the helper and compa- 
nion of man — woman, the wife, and mother; and in all 
which there is nothing of the fulsom»e nonsense about 



168 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

virginity, which renders the perusal of the fathers, ge- 
nerally, so nauseating; and he affirms too the equality of 
the sexes, in regard to piety and virtue. If, in fact, Cy- 
prian and TertuUian had been writers of the ninth cen- 
tury, we might well, in comparing them with Clement, 
have pointed to the difference, vast and glaring as it is, 
and have thereby confirmed ourselves in the common 
notion, that popery was a gradual departure from the 
good sense and purity of the early times of the church. 
But in truth these writers were the actual contempora- 
ries, though younger men, of Clement; and a portraiture 
of the Christianity of the period is to be found in their 
works, not in his. 

It is true that many of the fathers, or most of them, 
in their headlong course of fanaticism, and while beating 
the '* drum ecclesiastic," to get recruits for the monas- 
tery, think it due to their reputation to pull in for a mo- 
ment, once and again, and in so many words to disclaim 
the heresy of attributing the matrimonial institute to the 
devil. Yet the mere fact of their feeling it necessary 
to do so, is proof enough of tlie extent to which they 
were running. But, so far as I know, Clement of Alex- 
andria is the only extant writer, of the early ages, who 
adheres to common sense, and apostolic Christianity, 
through and through. Those who, at a later date, ven- 
tured to protest against the universal error, were instant- 
ly cursed and put down as heretics, by all the great di- 
vines of their times; and were, in fact, deprived of the 
means of transmitting their opinions to be more equita- 
bly judged of by posterity. 

It appears, or at least we should gather it from the 
language of Clement, that at Alexandria, the choir of vir- 
gins iiad not, in his time, been regularly constituted, as 
a standing order in the church; for where this band had 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 169 

been so sanctioned, it always took precedence of the 
corps of v/idows, and is mentioned, when they, as a part 
of the ecclesiastical system, are mentioned. But (Strom. 
lib. i.) where our author, in a formal manner, enume- 
rates the three orders of the clergy (as he does once and 
again) presbyters, bishops, and deacons, he subjoins, 
*' and the widows." Now in the *' Apostolic Constitu- 
tions," in the canons of the Ante-Nicene councils, and 
generally, in the writers of the same period, where any 
enumeration of orders occurs, it is — *' the virgins and 
the w^idows." 

In Clement's time, as he says, " the wells of martyr- 
dom were flowing daily;" we may therefore presume 
that as much of general seriousness, and sincerity, at- 
tached to the Christian community then, as usually be- 
longed to it; and yet what sort of description does he 
give us — altogether calm in its style — of the usual ap- 
pearances, on a Sunday, at the church doors, when the 
congregation broke up? Wliy, one might imagine one- 
self to be loitering about the doors of a fashionable cha- 
pel, in London, Bath, or Brighton. A world of illu- 
sions is sometimes dispelled by a very few simple sen- 
tences; and I think that were certain devout and credu- 
dulous worshippers of " venerable antiquity," and of 
the '* holy and ancient church," by chance to open upon 
the page of Clement which is now before me, having 
first been told that it described the breaking up of an 
assembly of the " martyr church," within a hundred 
years after the death of St. John, they would scarcely 
think themselves the same persons after having read it. 
Yet there is nothing extraordinary in this passage, there 
is no solemn lifting of a veil of mystery; absolutoly no- 
thing but an incidental allusion to facts, of an ordinary 
kind; — it is a description which might find its counter- 

15* 



170 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

part in any age, or any country, and is worthy of being 
noted on no account but because it tends to dissipate the 
fond, unphilosophical, and, as it now happens, the mis- 
chievous fancy about " pristine purity," and a golden 
age, to which we ungodly moderns should devoutly yield 
our judgments and conform our practices. 

*' Those who make profession of Christianity," says 
Clement, " should be all of a piece — they should, in the 
entire course of their lives, preserve a decorum and con- 
sistency, such as might agree with the exterior gravity 
to which they fashion themselves, just while at church; 
and they should strive to be, not merely to appear, what 
they would pass for; — so meek, so religious, so loving. 
But now, and how it is I hardly know, our folks, with 
change of place, change also their guize, and their modes 
of behaviour; and are something like polypi, which, as 
they say, resemble the rock on which they chance to 
fasten, and take their tinge from its colour. So these, 
the moment they get out of chapel, lay aside the demure 
and godly colour of sanctity, which they had worn while 
there; and, mingling in the crowd, are no longer to be 
distinguished from it. Or, as I ought rather to say, they 
then put off that well fashioned mask of gravity, which 
they had assumed, and are found to be such as they had 
not passed for. After having reverently waited upon 
God, and heard of him (in the church) they leave him 
there; and, out of doors, find their pleasure in ungodly 
fiddling, and love ditties, and what not — stage playing, 
and gross revelries. Thus, while they sing and respond, 
these (our people) who just before had been celebrating 
the glories of immortality, wickedly take their part in 
the most pernicious canticles; — as if saying. Let us eai 
and drink, for to-morrow we die. They indeed, not to- 
morrow, but now already, are dead unto God." 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 171 

Much more, nearly to the same purport, might be 
cited, were it needful, from the pages of Clement. In 
a word, his was an unimpassioned mind; and while he 
calmly and steadily insisted upon (so far as he understood 
it) the inspired rule of morality, he saw things around 
him, just as they were, and speaks of them, just as he 
found them; and his testimony, about which there is no- 
thing cynical, ought to be accepted as of the highest 
value, in correcting the false impression which is made 
upon our minds by others, who, as they saw every thing 
in an artificial glare, so allowed themselves a wide license 
in describing the illusions of their own distempered sight. 
There are those, now, I do not doubt, who, determined 
to retain the fond fancy of a golden pristine age, will 
turn with resentment from a matter-of-fact writer like Cle- 
ment, as if he did them a personal wrong in simply 
speaking the truth. For my own part, I can find no 
pleasure! in any thing, bearing upon religion, but the 
plainest truth. And the plain truth, in relation to the 
early church, is just to this effect — That, although pos- 
sessing, incidentally, certain prerogatives which render 
its testimony and judgment, on particular points, pecu- 
liarly important, it can advance no extraordinary claim 
to reverence, on the supposed plea of having possessed 
superior wisdom, discretion, or purity. And farther, I 
would be bold to express my belief that, if we exclude 
certain crazed fanatics of our times, the least esteemed 
community of orthodox Christians, among us — which 
ever that may be, if taken in the mass, and fairly mea- 
sured against the church catholic of the first two centu- 
ries, would outweigh it decisively in each of these quali- 
ties; I mean, in Christian wisdom, in common discretion, 
in purity of manners, and in purity of creed. Nay, I 



172 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

^m Strongly tempted to think that, if our Oxford divines 
themselves, and those who are used to take the law from 
their lips, and to learn church history at their feet, could 
but be blindfolded (if any such precaution, in their case 
were needed) and were fairly set down in ihe midst of 
the pristine church, at Carthage, or at Alexandria, or at 
Rome, or at Antioch, they would be fain to make iheir 
escape, with all possible celerity, toward their own times 
and country; and that thenceforward we should never 
hear another word from them about " venerable antiqui- 
ty," or the holy catholic church of the first ages. The 
effect of such a trip would, I liiink, resemble that pro- 
duced sometimes by crossing the Atlantic, upon those 
who have set out, westward, excellent liberals, and have 
returned eastward, as excellent tories. 

There is one very simple illusion, or as one might 
€all it, chronological fallacy, which it may seem almost 
an affront to common sense to mention; and yet I be- 
lieve that more than a few are set wrong a fifty years or 
even more, in their notions of Christian history in this 
very way. For instance, when the second century is 
spoken of, one may, without thought, admit tlie suppo- 
sition that a period of something like two hundred years, 
dating from the death of the apostles, is intended; 
whereas the notions or practices referred to, as belonging 
to the second century, may have had place within the 
distance of one hundred years from the cessation of the 
apostolic influence; and in fact they may be as ancient 
as any thing concerning which we are to derive our in- 
formation from uninspired Christian writers. It is thus 
with the practices with which we are now concerned; 
and which are as ancient as any other characteristics of 
ancient Christianity. 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 173 

I have referred, above, to Justin's statement concern- 
ing those who had dedicated themselves to the Lord, at 
a time when some of the apostles yet survived. Igna- 
tius clearly alludes to the same practice as then preva- 
lent; and he does so in terms indicative of the false and 
inflated sentiments which have in all ages been the at- 
tendants of this ill-considered endeavour to be " religious 
over much." " If any one (Epist. ad Polycarp.) be able 
to abide in purity (celibacy) in honour of the Lord's 
flesh, let him do so without boasting. If he boast, he is 
lost; or if he consider himself, on that account, to be 
more than the bishop, he perishes." 

It is not surmising too much to assume it as probable 
that, among the means resorted to by the self-willed and 
contumacious, for resisting the episcopal authority, and 
of which Ignatius was so zealous an advocate, this set- 
ting up for a fakir, was one, and perhaps it was one of 
the most eflicacious. See, on this point, the second sec- 
tion of the epistle to Hero. And as, at a later time, the 
confessors found themselves possessed of a credit with 
the populace which enabled them to defy legitimate au- 
thority, so, from the very first, whoever could be stark 
monk enough to make himself the idol of the rabble, be- 
came a leader of faction, and overaw^ed the bishops and 
presbyters. Unhappily these, and the long series of 
writers, favoured, instead of wisely repressing, the false 
piety that subverted order as well as morals. I would 
not, however, omit to mention that Ignatius (ad Heron.) 
fully and clearly vindicates matrimony, and honours wo- 
man. 

To the same purport, as in the passage cited above, 
the same father, (to the Phiiippians) but in terms just so 
far diversified as to carry a little more historical mean* 
ing, says, after exhorting husbands and wives to love 
each other, " If any lead the life of purity (that is, pre- 



174 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

serve virginity) or if any one practise continence (that 
is, either withdraw from husband or wife, or, being wi- 
dowed, avoid a second marriage) let him not be lifted up 
in mind, lest he lose the reward." Much is compre- 
hended in these few words; as, first, and in general, a 
clear allusion to the then frequent practice of religious 
celibacy; next, there is a note of the distinction which we 
find carefully observed, between the pure, and the conti- 
nent — terms equivalent, in ecclesiastical import, to the 
correlatives — nun, and widow, the former occupying a 
loftier place of honour than the latter. In another place 
he says — *' Guard the virgins, as Christ's jewels," an 
epithet often afterward applied to them. Ignatius also 
uses, and perhaps w^as the author of that favourite phrase, 
applied to nuns — " the espoused to Christ." Next, 
there is the necessary caution against that pride which 
had been found to attend this species of church n( bility; 
and lastly, there is the reference to that definite and pe- 
culiar celestial remuneration which was to attach to the 
band of virgins. Each of these indications, minute as 
they may seem, is pertinent to an historical inquiry. 

The Apostolic Constitutions are manifestly a very 
early, although a spurious work; and it was evidently 
put together with tlie intention of its passing as the pro- 
duction of the apostolic age. So far it may safely be 
cited as good evidence in our present inquiry; and here 
we find fully admitted that general feeling of tlie ancient 
church upon which TertuUian labours to build a still 
loftier doctrine. I mean, the feeling that, although a 
priest might be a married man, yet that a degree of de- 
gradation attached to that condition, so as that, either to 
marry after ordination, or to have contracted a second 
marriage, was a total disqualification for the sacred oflice; 
5ee, on this point, the seventeenth chapter of the sixth 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 175 

book; and this same canon exhibits the bondage of early 
Christians to the false principle which puts forms for 
substances; for, in allowing to the inferior church offi- 
cers, the singers, readers, and door keepers, a little more 
license, it assumes first, the absurdity that there could 
be degrees of holiness, corresponding to the degrees 
of ecclesiastical dignity; and then, that the circum- 
stance of being married, or single, or the having mar- 
ried once, or twice, had any thing whatever to do with 
a Christian's real sanctity. This twofold delusion, 
despicable as we must think it, stands forw^ard as the 
broad characteristic of the ancient church catholic. I 
remember, in fact, no one but Clement of Alexandria, 
for whom an exemption can be claimed in this respect; 
nor even for him in all instances. These Constitutions 
name also the two choirs, of nuns and w^idows, as then 
permanently constituted. The former, however, are 
warned against professing rashly; and it is forbidden to 
employ any means of compulsion in inducing them to 
do so; — " for, in regard to the virgin state, we have no 
commandment (as from the Lord) only that, once having 
professed, such should adorn their profession." 

The passages that have been cited, and, if these were 
not enough, three times the quantity are at hand to be 
produced, may, I think, be accepted as warranting what 
is affirmed in my second proposition, concerning the 
liigh antiquity of the notions, and of the accompanying 
practices, of religious celibacy. That is to say, this in- 
stitute, with all that involves, is as ancient as any other 
element of ancient Christianity, and may claim from us 
as much regard as is urged in behalf of any other prac- 
tice or opinion, on the ground of antiquity. In one 
word, religious celibacy comes fully under the quod 
SEMPER, or first condition of Vincent'^s rule of catholicity. 



176 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 



THE THIRD xVND FOURTH PROPOSITIONS, 
AND CONCLUDING REMARKS. 

We have next to look at the — quod iibique, and the — 
quod ab omnibus, in relation to our present subject; that 
is to show, that this principle, and these practices, be- 
longed to, and were thoroughly approved of by, the an- 
cient church, throughout its whole extent, so far as our 
historical materials enable us to ascertain the fact; and 
were explicitly maintained and promoted by all the 
great leaders of the religious commonwealth; and were 
excepted against by only here and there a solitary voice, 
which was almost instandy stifled by orthodox zeal. 

However warmly the ulterior inferences I have in 
view may be resented by some, I am sure they are not 
the persons who will come forward to call in question 
the facts which I here assume. On this ground, there- 
fore, the actual citation of proofs might be waived. But, 
in truth, as the establishment and illustration of my fifth 
thesis, and which it is of the utmost importance to make 
good, will demand a reference, more or less copious, to 
the extant w^orks of almost every ecclesiastical writer 
of the first seven centuries, these numerous citations 
will, of course, embrace whatever would have ofl^ered 
itself as proper for establishing the third and fourth pro- 
positions. We may, therefore, save ourselves the labour 
of going through a mass of duplicate evidences; and I 
therefore, in this place, and once for all, request you to 
bear in mind that, if either of these propositions were 
disputed, an ample confirmation of them is to be found 
in the series of quotations which are to sustain the fifth. 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 177 

For the present, then, I assume it as incontrovertible, 
whatever consequences it may be found to involve, that 
the doctrine and custom of religious celibacy was an ar- 
ticle of ancient Christianity, accepted and followed — 
semper, ubique, et ab omnibus. 

But at this point I am anxious to anticipate, and to 
preclude, some probable exceptions, by means of which 
it may be attempted to evade the general inferences I 
have in view. As, for example, there may be those, al- 
though it is certainly not the well-informed, who will 
say, "This notion, and these practices, so far as they 
might be culpable, were incidental merely, and may 
easily be separated from the general scheme of ancient 
Christianity, leaving us free to admire and imitate all 
the rest." Now, I must ask, what are the senses in 
which, in such a connexion, we might fairly apply the 
term incidentaU to an error of opinion and practice? 
The word may mean, then, a notion or practice which 
gained credit only for awhile, and which, having had 
its day, was forgotten; or, at most, rose to the surface 
only at remote intervals. But in no such sense as this 
was the doctrine of religious celibacy incidental to the 
ancient church; for there is no period, ever so short, that 
can be named, during which it lost its place or import- 
ance: on the contrary, it steadily held its — we may sig- 
nificantly say — proud pre-eminence, from the earliest 
times to the latest. 

Or, incidental may mean, in this instance, that, while 
some one or two of the ancient churches warmly em- 
braced the notion, and carried their admiration of it to 
an extravagant length, in other departments of the Chris- 
tian commonwealth, it was little heard of, or was coolly 
regarded, or actually discountenanced. But in this sense 

16 



178 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

also the term is excluded, inasmuch as the churches of 
the east, and the west, the north, and the south, vied 
with each other in their zeal on this ground; or, if all 
looked toward the east — Syria and Egypt — for bright 
patterns of excellence, in this w^alk of virtue, all showed 
substantially the same devotion in ascending the arduous 
path; and many were the pious pilgrimages, of some of 
which the memorials are on our shelves, that were un- 
dertaken expressly for the purpose of importing, into the 
remotest Christian regions, the spirit and usages of this 
very institute. 

Or, again, the term* incidental, thus employed, might 
mean, an opinion or institution, zealously promoted by 
a party or faction, within or without the church; but by 
no means favoured by its authorities, or by the mass of 
its members. In no such sense then can we here em- 
ploy the word. From age to age it was the church au- 
thorities, it was the most illustrious teachers and writers, 
that made it their glory to magnify this institute, and to 
extend its influence: nor were they, on this subject, 
listened to unwillingly by the people. 

There is, however, one other sense of the word, in 
which, if it could in fact be applied to the subject, it 
might be held either to loosen or to lessen the force of 
the serious inferences I am intending. That is to say,, 
if it could be affirmed that the theological principle, and 
the moral sentiment, imbodied in the institute of religious 
celibacy, are easily separable from the theological, ethi- 
cal, and ecclesiastical system of which it was an adjunct; 
and that it had therewith no sucli intimate and occult al- 
liances as would render a disjunction difficult, or such as 
must aflect the whole: then, indeed, it would only re- 
main for U3 to perform the desirable amputation, and so 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 179 

to restore health and symmetry to the body. But that 
no such allegation can be sustained, I shall be able in- 
contestably to prove; and, in doing so, shall, as I con- 
fidently hope, succeed in affording the most convincing 
proof of the fact, that the Christian teachers, from the 
very firsts and, while they held the formal elements of 
truth, or, as it is called, orthodoxy, grossly misappre- 
hended the genius and purport of Christianity; and, as 
a consequence of this misapprehension, turned out of its 
course every Christian institute, and put on a false foun- 
dation every principle of virtue; and thus transmuted the 
Christian system into a scheme which could find no 
other fixed form than that of a foul superstition, and a 
lawless despotism. 

I think, moreover, that the intimacy of the connexion 
between the institute in question and the other elements 
of ancient Christianity will so appear as will serve to 
clear up the practical embarrassments that have attached, 
in modern times, to every endeavour to realize these, 
apart from the other. Such imitations have always de- 
manded some foreign aid to keep them in existence, and 
can subsist only so long as they may chance to derive 
vital force and nutriment from an extraneous body. In 
this conviction I can think nothing else probable but 
that, should the scheme of doctrine maintained in the 
Oxford Tracts become, by any means, actually detached 
from its present hold on the civil and ecclesiastical insti- 
tutions of the country, and be exempted also from re- 
straint; — in a word, fairly left to itself, and allowed to 
follow its innate affinities, it would instantly resume its 
severed element — the ancient doctrine and practice of 
celestial virginity. It may seem utterly incredible that 
Englishmen, and those who have actually stood in the 
radiance of scriptural illumination, and have read the 



180 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

lessons of history, should yield themselves to an illusion 
such as this. To me, all this appears far from incredi- 
ble; and, unless a timely caution, and the fear of suddenly 
forfeiting the allegiance of numbers, should avail to re- 
tard the course of things, it is what I think may be daily 
looked for. 

But we must meet, in all its strength, a startling diffi- 
culty, which will no doubt have occurred to some, in re- 
flecting upon the facts to which, in the preceding pages, 
I have made reference. Granting, as we must grant, that 
the institute of celibacy, when it reached its mature state, 
and involving, as it necessarily did, an open contraven- 
tion of the apostolic precepts concerning the clergy, was 
a great and mischievous error, yet did it not take its 
rise from the language of our Lord himself, and of Paul; 
and does not the conduct of those who, in the first in- 
stance, devoted themselves to celibacy, at the least stand 
excused from reprehension, if it be not fully justified 
by the passages of scripture usually cited in this in- 
stance? 

Now I wish the difficulty thus stated to be felt in its 
utmost force. Let it be granted, then, that the entire 
scheme, with all its consequences, and which have con- 
stituted, in the end, the vital elements of the Romish su- 
perstition, took its commencement, and in a manner 
barely culpable, from certain expressions (albeit mis- 
understood) of the inspired writings. Now, this admis- 
sion, which I think must in candour be made, gives us 
precisely that connecting link, which renders the in- 
stance available for the purpose, with a view to which 
it has been here adduced. Unless it had appeared that 
the principle and practice of religious celibacy took their 
3tart from the scriptures themselves, neither that high 



OP tHE ANCIENT CHURCH* 181 

antiquity which we have proved to attach to them, nor 
the universal testimony of the church in their favour, 
would have warranted the use I am making of the in- 
stance, as closely analogous to the several points now 
controverted. 

But as it stands, there is absolutely nothing that can 
be advanced in favour of any one of those now disputed 
articles of belief, or of usage, which may not, and to the 
whole extent of the terms, be pleaded in behalf of the 
institute of celibacy. Are they immemorially ancient? — 
so is this. Did they receive the assent and warm ap- 
probation of the long series of Christian doctors? — so did 
this. Were they acknowledged and followed out in the 
practices of the apostolic churches, throughout the world? 
— so was this; and finally, may they pretend to a colour 
of support, or more than a colour, from some (ew ex- 
pressions of the inspired writers? — so may this. I chal- 
lenge contradiction in affirming that the monastic sys* 
tern, and the celibacy of the clergy, rest on ground as 
wide and as solid as that which sustains any one of the 
doctrines or practices which it has been the peculiar in- 
tention of the Oxford Tracts to recommend. 

There are, as I presume, very (e\v protestants (it is 
hard to imagine how there can be one such) or any cler- 
gyman of the protestant church, who would profess to 
think the monkish institute, abstractedly, good, and the 
celibacy of the clergy a wise and useful provision; or 
who would wish to see this system, and the notions and 
sentiments that attend it, brought back upon us, in any 
form whatever. Although it may have been fondly em- 
braced — semper, ubique, et ab omnibus — it is to be re- 
jected; and although it may have its texts of scripture at 
hand, nevertheless it is to be rejected. In this instance 
we claim exemption, not merely from the usurpations 

16^ 



182 A TEST OF THE MORAL •CONDITION 

and corruptions of Rome, but from the unbroken and 
loudly uttered authority of the holy catholic church; and 
when it was in its (supposed) condition of pristine purity. 
Nor is this all; for we go on calmly to consider the real 
import of the passages which have been made to bear 
the weight of this system; and we compare such single 
passages with the plain import of other passages; and 
with the general purport of the inspired writings; and 
we judge of them also by considering the genius and 
spirit of the gospel; and having done so, we find no real 
difficulty remaining; but only a very simple case, de- 
manding, just what is demanded always, namely, the 
exercise of sound good sense and discrimination. 

But, alas! the leaders of the early church would exer- 
cise no such discrimination: they would give place to no 
dictates of calm good sense; and having surrendered 
themselves to a headlong enthusiasm, the opposing im- 
port of other portions of scripture was totally overlooked, 
or perversely evaded; and they followed whither they 
were led, and they led after them the church universal, 
until altogether plunged into an abyss of error and of cor- 
ruption. 

Now the course w^hich every protestant (as I assume) 
is absolutely compelled to take, when he is called upon 
to consider the Romish ccelibate; namely, to hold in 
abeyance his reverence for antiquity, and to claim ex- 
emption from the decisions of the holy catholic church, 
and to examine, with care and calmness, the real pur- 
port of scripture, taken at large, is neither more nor less 
than w^hat every sober-minded protestant is, as I think, 
bound to do, when challenged to yield himself to certain 
other notions and practices, characteristic of ancient 
Christianity. To do any thing less than this, is virtually 
to surrender all that stands between us and the mon- 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 183 

strous superstitions of the times of Gregory the Great, 
We may not, perhaps, become Romanists; but v/e must, 
in all consistency, become such as that it were better to 
accept Romanism, whole and entire. A well-defined 
and authoritative system (involving elements of evil) is, 
I think, much to be preferred to an undefined system, 
involving the very same elements; and I firmly believe 
that it were, on the whole, better for a community to 
submit itself, without conditions, to the well-known tri- 
dentine popery, than to take up the Christianity of Am- 
brose, Basil, Gregory Nyssen, Chrysostom, Jerome, and 
Augustine. Personally, I would rather be a Christian 
after the fashion of Pascal and Arnold, than after that of 
Cyprian or Macarius; but how much rather after that of 
our own protestant worthies, who, although entangled 
by fond notions about the ancient church, were, in heart, 
and in the main bent of their lives, followers, not of the 
fathers, but of the apostles! 

The great men I have referred to — the glory of our 
English protestantism, were, it must be confessed, en- 
tangled with ancient Christianity; and they were so in 
a degree that has involved the church they founded in 
some serious difSculties : but we may not boast over 
them; for we are ourselves still labouring with the con- 
ceit concerning — venerable antiquity, and the purity of 
the early ages; nor will it be very soon that this invete- 
rate prejudice will be altogether and finally broken up. 
Few will either undergo the labour of becoming fami- 
liarly conversant with the documents of Christian anti- 
quity, or will severely analyze the notions which this 
prejudice imbodies. 

In concluding this tract, 1 beg permission to offer 
some assistance in instituting this necessary analysis; or 
rather, plainly to state the case which this prejudice in- 



184 A TEST OF TttU MORAL CONDITION 

volves: and moreover, will view it, as from the position 
of those who religiously receive the doctrines of the 
Oxford Tracts. 

The writers of these tracts have, and, as 1 must 
humbly think, in a very seasonable as well as able man- 
ner, protested against the modern phase of infidelity, 
called — rationalism, and which, if followed out consis- 
tently, can come to nothing but, first unitarianism, and 
then deism, and then pantheism, and then the purest 
atheism. They may have taken an unfair advantage of 
the incautious language of some well meaning writers; 
but yet have, as I think, truly exhibited the inner quality, 
and the necessary tendency of this modern scheme of 
theology. Moreover, they have not merely protested 
against this prevailing illusion, but have admitted the fact 
that it has actually become the type of our modern pro- 
testant Christianity; and also, have intimated their fears 
that, unless vigorously repelled, it will, ere long, em- 
brace the protestant world, a few remonstrants excepted, 
and propel all down the slippery descent toward univer- 
sal unbelief. 

Now let us for a moment suppose that nearly as much 
as this, melancholy as is the idea, had actually come 
about in our times; and that (the (cw remonstrants ex- 
cepted) there was no other form of genuine belief extant 
in the world than that of the Romish Church, which, 
as. is admitted, is laden with corruptions. In such a case 
then, nor does it appear why we may not imagine it as 
possible, or even as probable, there would prevail, not- 
withstanding our Lord's promise to be with his church 
always, an almost universal defection or apostacy — on the 
one side toward atheism, on the other side toward super- 
stition. 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 185 

We suppose then such an apostacy to have had place, 
in the nineteenth century. What then stands in the way 
of our supposing an analogous defection to have be- 
longed to some preceding age, or even to the first, or to 
the second? If we say — the extant historical evidence 
contradicts any such supposition, this is the very point 
in dispute; nor can I allow the question to be begged so 
easily. But what general principle is there which for- 
bids our admitting such a proposition? Not any vague 
belief concerning the divine benevolence toward man- 
kind; for this is unchangeable; and, if it must have pre- 
vented an apostacy in the first century, must also have 
prevented it in the nineteenth; nor by the same rule, 
can we admit any other contravening principle, as ap- 
plicable to the one period, which does not equally apply 
to the other. 

Among the predictive promises, or the ofiicial instruc- 
tions addressed by our Lord to his personal followers, 
some, very clearly, were applicable to themselves indi- 
vidually, and ceased to have any operation or efficacy, 
at the moment when the functions of these individuals 
were fulfilled. Other of these promises, not less clearly, 
are the property of his servants and ministers, in all 
ages. But is there so much as one of these words of 
power and comfort, which, while it passes onward be- 
yond the individuals who first heard it, yet does not pass 
forward for the benefit of the church universal; but stays 
within certain limits, as, for example, the limits of the 
first, the second, or the third centuries? In other words, 
was there any promise of guidance, or assistance, or of 
exemption from error, granted to the ancient church, 
other than w^hat belongs, in its fullest force, to the church 
of all ages? I presume it cannot be pretended that the 



186 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

ancient church had any such advantage over ourselves; 
or that it was in any sense whatever the occupier of a 
peculiar benefit " on lease," or *' for a term of years." 

But if not, then the question concerning the actual con- 
dition of the ancient church is entirely open; and after 
we have dispelled from our minds, the fancy, really 
childish as it is, about " antiquity," and a " golden age," 
we then turn, with perfect coolness, to the documents in 
our possession, and submit its pretensions to a candid, 
but unsparing analysis. 

If the ancient church was benefited by no interposi- 
tions more direct than those which, in every age, have 
maintained truth and piety from utter extinction, then we 
must believe, and must expect to find our belief verified, 
that, in coming, as it did, suddenly, and without the aid 
of any experience, into contact with the most prodigious 
evils, it at once imparted an impulse, and admitted an im- 
pulse: — ^^or, as we say in mechanics, action and reaction, 
were equal. Did Christianity encounter the rigid, punc- 
tilious, and self-righteous pietism of the Jew? In the 
collision the Judaism of those who, of the Hebrew race, 
embraced the gospel, gave way to some extent, and was 
Christianized; and, in return, Christianity at large was 
Judaized. Or, did it meet the vain philosophy and Pla- 
tonism of the speculative Greek? it did so; and Platon- 
ism and Christianity thenceforward were intimately com- 
mingled. Did it impinge upon human society, then 
debauched in a most extraordinary degree? it did so, and, 
with a violent revulsion, it distorted its own principles 
of virtue, in an equally extreme degree. Finally, did 
the religion of the New Testament, rational, spiritual, 
pure, confront the degrading superstitions of the pagan 
world? it did so, and on this ground, while it bore a 






OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 187 

clear testimony against the doctrine and the flagitious 
practices of polytheism, yet merged itself in the bound- 
less superstition of the times, as a system of fear, spi- 
ritual servitude, formality, scrupulosity, visible magnifi- 
cence of worship, mystery, artifice, and juggle. Such 
were the antagonist principles, in contending with each 
of which the holy religion of Christ triumphed in each 
instance, and in each was trampled upon; conquered and 
was conquered; — diffused light and health, and admitted 
darkness and corruption. 

Nevertheless its utter extinction was prevented: — the 
external means of its regeneration were preserved, and 
the times of regeneration actually came. Forgetting the 
things that were behind, and returning once again to the 
long buried scriptures, the church has regained its vitality; 
and, amid a thousand errors, lives, and prepares herself 
to occupy the world, for her Lord. 

But if there be only the most general verisimilitude in 
the representations above given, in what light are we to 
view the incredibly strange endeavour to bring back, 
upon the modern and revived church, the very notions 
and practices that were the consequences of the strug^des 
of the ancient church with its antagonists? Shall we 
then indeed be led to reverence and imitate the very ar- 
ticles that are to be pointed out to as marking the admix- 
ture of Christianity with Judaism — with Greek philo- 
sophy — with pagan corruption — and with polytheistic 
superstition? Shall we part from our religion, as we 
find it fixed in the scriptures, and madly follow it, in its 
first fearful plunge into the bottomless gulf of spiritual 
darkness and moral pollution? If the phrase — Christian 
antiquity, can be allowed to convey no idea of pre-emi- 
nence beyond what the strict rules of historical logic may^ 



188 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION 

under all the circumstances, allow to it, then, manifestly, 
the inexperienced and convulsive struggles of the infant 
religion with its formidable foes, how well soever they 
may merit our admiration, are less likely than almost 
any other cycle of religious events, to secure our cool 
approval, or to command our submission, as if then a 
pattern of wisdom and order were to be given to the 
church of all ages. 

A religious mind, after having contemplated the 
changing scene of human error and folly, from age to 
age, and after admitting, for awhile, some painful sen- 
timents of reprehension, in thinking of the authors and 
promoters of such errors, gladly turns, first, to those 
many circumstances of extenuation which may be ad- 
vanced in behalf of these mistaken men, and which shall 
allow us, notwithstanding, to think of many of them as 
brethren in Christ. But then, such a mind seeks a far- 
ther solace, in tracing, dimly perhaps, the apparent pur- 
poses of Him who, even when most he allows evil to 
have its course, yet sways the general movement, and 
urges forward still the development of his mighty scheme 
of universal government. A religious mind holds to the 
belief that He who worketh, in all things, according to 
the counsel of his own will, has, in every age, been 
evolving a settled plan; whether or not it may be intel- 
ligible to the human mind. 

Now, in this belief, we are led at once to look, if not 
with more complacency, at least with less distress, upon 
particular forms of what we must still regard as capi- 
tal error, and to think of them as, in some way, tempo- 
rary adaptations of truth to the circumstances of man- 
kind at such or such a period: in this light considered, 
the sharpness of our displeasure is a little broken down, 
and our stern condemnation tempered. There is a real, 



OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH. l89 

and, as I think, a legitimate consolation to be derived 
from considerations of this sort. But then the very- 
principle whence it is derived, namely, that the Lord has 
been giving place to accommodations, or appliances of 
this sort, from age to age, thereby effecting a slow, and 
often retarded progression, in advancing the religious 
condition of mankind, this principle, I say, implies an 
unutterable absurdity in the endeavour, made at any ad- 
vanced period of the great scheme, to revert to a posi- 
tion long ago passed by and obsolete. 

If we comfort ourselves with the thought that a vast 
scheme has been, from the first, in movement, the end 
of which shall be the universal triumph of truth and 
peace, then must we be thinkin'g of any thing rather 
than of a turning back upon the great road of the church's 
progress, and of forfeiting the toils of centuries; or, in 
other words, of rendering ourselves, by imitation, such 
as that which, when it actually existed, was but a low 
alloy of truth, permitted or winked at for awhile. And 
if, in any sense, we allow ourselves to be called pro- 
testants, our profession must imply the acknowledg- 
ment that the great scheme of religious development has, 
during the last three centuries, made a conspicuous de- 
monstration, and has set us forward far, very far, in ad- 
vance of the position occupied by our predecessors of 
the fourteenth century. Who must not acknowledge this? 
What impiety to deny it! 

And what have been the characteristics of this alleged 
modern advancement? Not the devising of novelties in 
religion, as something that might be added to the apos- 
tolic model; not the boldly taking the scriptures in hand, 
with the endeavour to cut them down to our liking, or 
to cast them in the mould of our modern philosophy. 
This has not been the course we have taken; but the 

17 



190 A TEST OF THE MORAL CONDITION, &C. 

very reverse, namely, an intent reference to the apos'* 
tolic authority, in all things, and an almost overwrought 
anxiety to know and to imbody the very form of apos-^ 
tolic Christianity. Whereas now, such being the cha- 
racter and specific quality of the course of events in the 
church, in modern times^ the character and the quality 
of the course of events in the ancient church was the 
very contrary; namely, a perpetual superposition of ma- 
terials upon the apostolic foundation, at the capricious 
bidding of superstition, enthusiasm, fanaticism, spiritual 
tyranny, craft, and hypocrisy: such, I say, being, when 
the two periods are broadly regarded, the distinctive 
and contrasted features of each, no powers of language 
come to one's aid when one would fain express the 
sense one has of the folly of the endeavour, to say 
nothing of its audacity, to induce the church to relin- 
quish its own hopeful characteristic, and to put on that 
of the long gone-by period of ignorance, decay, delusion!- 
The Lord himself disappoint any such mad attempt! 



NOTE. 

Lest it shotild be thought that in afRrming pp. 31 and 184, the 
Nicene church to have been the mark at which our EngUsh re- 
formers aimed, and the model of our church polity, I subjoin an 
extract from Brett, who is adduced by the Oxford Tract writers 
among their witnesses to the soundness of their principles, and 
as speaking the sense of the English church. 

*' As the church never was so strictly and firmly united as in 
the primitive times^ and particularly about the time when the 
Council of Nice was celebrated; so, if ever the church be as 
firmly united again, it must be upon the same principles and 
practices. The church never was united but upon the principles 
and usages which obtained at the time of the Nicene Council v 
and we have, therefore, good reason to believe that it never cai> 
be united but upon those principles and usages." 



INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 

The course of argument open before us, in the pre- 
sent instance, is straightforward, and the inference it in- 
volves is clear and conclusive. I have undertaken to 
show, by numerous and varied citations, not merely that 
the doctrine and practice of religious celibacy occupied 
a prominent place in the theological and ecclesiastical 
system of the Nicene church, a fact hardly needing to 
be proved, but that the institute was intimately and in- 
separably connected with, and that it powerfully affected, 
every other element of ancient Christianity, whether 
dogmatic, ethical, ritual, or hierarchical. If, then, such 
a connexion can be proved to have existed, we must 
either adopt its notions and usages in this essential par- 
ticular, or must surrender very much of our veneration 
for ancient Christianity. 

The fact of the intimate connexion here affirmed is 
really not less obvious or easily established than that of 
the mere existence of the institute itself. Modern church 
writers may, indeed, have thrown the unpleasing subject 
into the back-ground, and so it may have attracted much 
less attention than its importance deserves; but we no 
sooner open the patristic folios than we find it confront- 
ing us, on almost every page; and if either the general 
averment were questioned, or the bearing of the celibate 
upon every part of ancient Christianity were denied, vo- 
lumes might be filled with the proofs that attest the one 
as well as the other. Both these facts must be admitted 



192 INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 

by all unprejudiced inquirers who shall take the pains to 
look into the extant remains of Christian antiquity. 

But of what sort, then, was the influence which flowed 
from the notions and usages of the ancient celibacy? 
Was it beneficial and salubrious, or pernicious; or was 
it neither the one nor the other — an innoxious ingredi- 
ent, which might have been withdrawn without either 
sensible advantage or serious detriment? This question 
we have the means of bringing to a satisfactory conclu- 
sion; or even if the present writer should fail to effect as 
much as he has undertaken, some other, more compe- 
tent to the task, would not fail to discern, and to make 
good use of, so obvious an occasion for winning a signal 
triumph in a controversy of the highest moment. 

There are those who are now telling the Christian 
world (in so many w^ords, as well as by frequent impli- 
cations) that the doctrine and discipline which were pro- 
mulgated in a crude form by the apostles, reached a ma- 
ture state about the time of the council of Nice; and that 
it is in the writings of the great divines of that age that 
we are to look for the finished model of our religion. It 
is, as I think, a most auspicious circumstance that those 
who entertain a belief such as this, have done themselves 
the honour, and the church at large the service, of 
making themselves so clearly understood; and that thus 
a multifarious controversy is reduced within narrow li- 
mits, and is submitted to the rules of a plain historical 
inquiry. Only let the Oxford writers adhere to this pro- 
fession of their faith, and we may hope to see the con- 
troversy reach its issue at no distant period. 

But then these same writers will feel themselves com- 
pelled to dispose of the critical subject of the ancient 
celibacy in some more definite manner than can be ef- 
fected by the means of a few timid and ambiguous allu» 



rNTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 193 

eions to it; for it will not long be permitted to the cham- 
pions and admirers of ancient Christianity to evade a 
theme which touches, at a hundred points, the general 
■scheme of doctrines and practices they are labouring to 
recommend. These divines cannot but feel that the 
credit so generally given them for religious integrity as 
ministers of the gospel, and for honourable ingenuous- 
ness as controvertists, imposes upon them the necessity 
of frankly stating what their belief is on this cardinal 
point. 

Either the ancient celibacy, with its allied asceticism, 
was abstractedly good, and its influence was holy and 
elevating; or the reverse was true; or it was neither the 
one nor the other, and altogether indifferent; or it was 
partly beneficial, and partly pernicious. Something de- 
finite must needs be said on the subject, and a choice 
must be made among these suppositions, before we can 
be free either to accept, or to reject, the Nicene model 
of Christianity. As well attempt to recommend Maho- 
met's scheme of religion, and yet say nothing of his 
doctrine of paradise, as go about to restore ancient 
Christianity, leaving in the shade — its celibate and its 
monkery. 

The Oxford Tract writers have, no doubt, maturely 
considered this untoward subject, and will in due time 
declare themselves plainly concerning it; nor does it ap- 
pear how ihey can do otherwise than boldly take up the 
only position which their pledged adherence to the Ni- 
cene church leaves open to them, and toward which in- 
deed they have already opened the way.* Mean while 

* Dr. Pusey's Letter to the Bishop of Oxford, assumes, as I 
shall hereafter show, the very ground on which the ancient celi- 
bacy rested. 

17* 



194 INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 

I invite the reader's attention to a mass and series of 
proofs which, as I think, must exclude every supposi- 
tion but one, concerning the influence of the notions in 
question, and the real quality of the religious and eccle- 
siastical system to which they attached. 

The actual influence of particular religious opinions 
or practices, is not always found to be such as, at a first 
glance, we might have expected: often it is the very re- 
verse; and when, at length, we discover the error into 
which we had fallen, we are not unlikely to admit, too 
hastily, a favourable impression of that which we per- 
ceive not to have produced the sort of bad consequences 
we had hitherto attributed to it. This is a pitfall always 
to be kept in view. Multitudes have relapsed into pope- 
ry, and not a few have fallen into Socinianism, simply 
because, in becoming better acquainted with the one or 
the other, their original and vague notions concerning it 
had not been realized. 

With the hope then of precluding any such accident 
in the present instance, and also, in order to exhibit, as 
plainly as possible, what I mean by the difl*used and oc- 
cult influence which an opinion or practice may extend 
over the system it belongs to, I will adduce what may 
seem an extreme example, and yet it is a pertinent one. 

— Let it be supposed then that we have in view some 
religious national system of which the practice of infanti- 
cide is a part, and is not merely tolerated, but authorized, 
and encouraged, commended, extolled, and practised. 
Now none can imagine that such a doctrine, and such a 
practice, would be found to have taken no hold of a peo- 
ple's manners and sentiments; rather we should be in- 
clined, without hesitation or due inquiry, to attribute a 
gross and savage ferocity to a community disgraced by 
60 foul a stain. But herein we might find ourselves al- 



INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 195 

together in error, and perhaps, when actually convinced 
of our mistake, we might almost begin to ask if the 
practice itself were really so abominable as we had been 
used to think it. 

But a better informed, and a more cautious inquirer, 
adhering steadily to the immoveable principles of morali- 
ty, nor ever skeptical concerning the constant elements 
of human nature, would patiently look about, or would 
look more narrowly into the system, and beneath its 
surface, for what he must at length discover, — namely, 
the deep working, and the universally diffused poison, 
of this horrid usage. How lofty soever, in style and 
mien, such a people may seem, and whatever heroism 
may have often connected itself with the atrocious prac- 
tice, yet the philosophical moralist, sure of his princi- 
ples, will go on with his analysis of the people's senti- 
ments and condition, until he has laid bare the ulcer that 
is at their heart. 

And such an analysis would, in the end, make it cer- 
tain, that there was no single opinion, however appa- 
rently insulated, no characteristic of the national temper, 
no element of the private and domestic economy, actu- 
ally exempt from the contamination of this cancerous 
tumour. Within this infanticide-community mothers 
might perhaps exhibit the highest intensity of the pa- 
rental affection, and might be seen, to-day submitting to 
the most extreme privations for the sake of the very 
babe which, to-morrow, they will coolly offer to the 
murderous knife of a fanatical priest. There might seem 
to be no want of moral energy among such a people; 
and yet assuredly there would be a total want of genu- 
ine virtue: and if their morals were vitiated and extra- 
vagant, of what sort would be their religion? Nothing 
better, we may be certain, than a grim demonoiogy — a 



196 INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 

worship, not of the author of the human system, but of 
its destroyer, 

V/henever a religious practice, plainly interfering with 
the common principles of human nature, is not found to 
be such, in its immediate influence, as we might have 
supposed, it will be because itself springs from some 
much deeper or higher principle, touching the human 
mind more profoundly, and therefore, in so far as it has 
its origin more toward the centre, it affects every thing 
else in the heart, temper, behaviour, and understanding. 
In such a case then, the particular practice in question 
may either be assumed as a general characteristic of the 
moral system of which it is a part, or it may be em- 
ployed more exactly, as a clue, serving us when we 
would make our way through the intricacies of that sys- 
tem. 

It is precisely thus with the celibacy of the ancient 
church: far too deeply did it touch the most potent im- 
pulses of human nature to be in itself of small account. 
Whatever had the power so to thwart and trample upon 
the animal and moral constitution, had a power too, to 
disturb every thing else within the bosom, or the mind 
of man; nor could it fail to exert this power. It were 
idle to speak of one who goes about with iron spikes in his 
shoes, or with a festering hook in his ribs, as if he were, 
in other respects, just like his fellows; or as if he could 
retain his hold of the common principles of good sense, 
and of the gentle domestic affections: — such a being is 
not in truth a man. The fakir may smile, and talk soft- 
ly, but all his notions and feelings are such as are burned 
into the soul by the indwelling of a fiend. Whatever 
it is, whether doctrine or social usage, that lords it over 
our physical and moral constitution, will be sure to play 
ibe master among things so much more flimsy and piia- 



INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 197 

ble as are theological dogmas and ecclesiastical constitu- 
tions. What! shall a man's heart be grasped, and 
wrenched, and torn out of its place by a force which yet 
will not, or cannot mould and twist the fleeting creations 
of the brain? This will never happen, or never if the 
laws of moral and intellectual dynamics are at all to be 
calculated upon. Craze a man in his affections, and you 
need not set about to craze him in his understanding; for 
it is done already. Such a one sees every thing in false 
proportions, misjudges all magnitudes, misplaces the 
major and minor of every proposition, and has become 
a universal sophist, not indeed by ill intention, or want 
of reason; but by the cruel misfortune that has disjointed 
his moral symmetry. 

This is felt by every sound-minded reader in looking 
into the ancient church writers: — it is not an error in one 
place, and an inconclusive argument in another; but it is 
generally a distorted condition of the moral and religious 
nature: every thing is as if it had been on the rack. 
Often one is perplexed in the endeavour to trace to its 
true cause this derangement of notions, of which, never- 
theless, one is constantly and painfully conscious; but on 
such occasions it is seldom that the mystery is not cleared 
up by a recurrence to the leading fact of the terrible vio- 
lence that had been done to human nature by the ascetic 
system. Here is the fatal secret of very many of the 
illusions, and the exaggerations, and the corruptions, of 
ancient Christianity. 

The instance I have just adduced, by the way of illus- 
tration, namely, the practice of infanticide, I have ad- 
mitted to be an extreme one; and it is so if we think of 
its direct criminaliiy, as compared with the vow of vir- 
ginity. But in any other point of view, it is by no 
fneans extreme; and I think that those who are the best 



198 INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 

acquainted with human nature, will be ready to admit 
that the one practice indicates the presence of as great 
a power of disturb ance (to borrow a phrase) as does the 
other. In other words, that the practice of celibacy im- 
plies as profound, and extensive a derangement of the 
moral system, as does the practice of infanticide: — the 
single act was indeed more flagitious; but the motive 
prompting it was not of a more sovereign kind, nor less 
likely to shed its influence far and wide. 

Now whatever recommendations of fervour or of se- 
raphic heroism might be found to attach to a communi- 
ty practising infanticide, on pretext of religion, it is not 
conceivable that we should ever consent to go to such a 
society to be schooled, either in theology, or in morals, 
or that we should think it safe to borrow from so tainted 
a source any order of sentiments; for we should feel that, 
whetlier or not the poison had always broke out on the 
surface, every thing thence derived must, in fact, be lia- 
ble to the gravest suspicions. But the same caution 
ought not the less to be regarded when it is proposed, 
as now, by the Oxford divines, to borrow largely and 
freely from the plague-stricken Nicene church. What 
can be more unsafe than to listen submissively to those 
who, themselves, had undergone the moral and the the- 
ological mischief, or violence, connected with the celi- 
bate doctrine and practice — which practice had already 
become loaded with the most extreme and offensive 
abuses! If we dare not take lessons from teachers ap- 
plauding and practising infanticide, how is it that we can 
dare to listen to those who applauded and practised a 
custom which, though not in the same sense a crime, 
could not have become general, without involving an 
equal, or even a greater distortion both of natural senti- 
rnents and of theoretic principles? 



Introductory statements. 199 

The real history of the ancient church (I do not mean 
so much of this history as may meet the eye in modern 
works) plainly shows, not only that the worst enormi- 
ties (sometimes) and the wildest extravagances (often) 
attached to the ascetic life, but also, and which is a fact 
of more significance, that dogmas and modes of devo- 
tional sentiment fitting such excesses, were adopted, or 
were fallen into, by even the wisest and best of the the- 
ologians of the times. What violence then must be done 
to every known principle of analogy, in the moral world, 
if, after all, it is to be believed that the Nicene church 
had reached, in doctrine, in ritual, in discipline, and in 
devotional temper, just that palmy state, bordering on 
absolute perfection, which should render it the proper 
object of our veneration and imitation! What may not 
be true if this be true? 

But even if so utterly incredible a supposition were 
admitted, we should not have made our way through the 
difficulties of the case, and these are to be surmounted 
only by a procedure from which, as I suppose, all but a 
very few would recoil with horror. It is well to look 
these farther difficulties fully in the face. — The Nicene 
church-system was one system, firmly compacted, com* 
pacted by energies, within, and by pressure from with* 
out: nothing hung loose upon it; nothing was out of har- 
mony within it. W^e totally deceive ourselves if, carry* 
ing our modern notions up to those ages, we think that 
the Christian community in the fourth century was like 
the modern religious mass — a heterogeneous aggregate, 
owing submission ta no central power, wrought upon 
from within, and from without, by a thousand forces^- 
wholly independent one of ^ the other, giving ihe freest 
scope to individual impulses, and therefore presenting 



200 INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 

many glaring instances of anomaly, and contrariety^ 
The ancient church wore no such many-coloured cloakf 
and how much soever it might be distracted by parti- 
cular controversies, it was very nearly of one temper, 
as to its moral ingredients. This assertion might receive 
curious illustration by a collation of the style of men 
the most opposed on points of theology. But it must 
suffice here to advert to the fact, which will not be dis- 
puted, of the homogeneity of the religious system, with- 
in the boundaries of the orthodox church, to say no 
more. What then is the practical inference thence re- 
sulting? Plainly this, that, if we go a borrowing from 
this Nicene church, piece-meal, taking out of it what 
we may fancy, and leaving behind that which in fact 
was woven v^ith it, and formed one texture, we shall 
come off miserably disappointed in the result; for what 
we have obtained is not, in fact, what we were grasp- 
ing at. 

As well append an amputated limb to a living body, as 
attempt to set certain detached portions of ancient Chris- 
tianity agoing, in combination with our modern church 
notions and practices. What we have adopted will pu- 
trefy, but it will not walk. Yielding ourselves to a fond 
veneration of antiquity, we may ape the sanctimonious 
carriage of the Nicene age, we may imitate, and punctili- 
ously enact, the sacramental superstitions, as got up in the 
porphyry-columned basilics of Constantinople, Antioch, 
and Rome; we may talk in the big phrases of Chrysostom, 
Gregory, and Ambrose, of the " tremendous mysteries" 
of the church, and may exhaust all powers of language 
in setting forth the efficacy and dignity of the sacerdo- 
tal functions: — we may strut and swell, we may rave, 
or be sullen, as we please; but all will not do — our copy 



INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 20 1 

Indeed is perfect to a hair, but there is no life or mo- 
tion in it. The Nicene church, with its pomps and aw-^ 
ful rites, embraced a mystery, tremendous indeed — a 
motive and a doctrine which, after trampling, in tyran- 
nous mockery, upon the most potent forces of human 
nature, lent its superfluous power to whatever else might 
seem to need animation or support. 

Idle then is the industry of our modern restorers of 
antiquity, who are copying the Nicene church, but yet 
scruple (or scruple at present) to adopt the master ele- 
ment of the system — the heart of the body — the key- 
stone of the arch, tlie cement of the structure. The 
Romish copyist knew far better what they were aboul^ 
and their imitation of antiquity has stood on its feet, 
and spoken, and gone about, and wrougiit its will, like 
a living body: the Romish representation of ancient 
Christianity is a dau^ltler-^too like her mother to allow 
her filial relationship to be for a moment qiiestionf^d; but 
what is now in course of finishing, wiiiiin our protes- 
tant church, is nothing belter than a wax model, which 
although it startles us when we come upon it, unpre- 
pared, chills us when we touch it, and from which we 
presently turn away in contempt. 

Marvellously indeed have tliose shown their ignorance 
of human nature, who have allowed themselves to ihink 
of the ancient celibacy and its asceticism, as \i' they were 
separable adjuncts of ancient Christianity; and strangely 
too have they overlooked the entire evidence of histo- 
ry. The philosophy of morals apart, how can we be 
justified in assuming those things to have been loosely or 
accidentally conjoined, which, in fact, never existed a])art 
for so long a time as one year, or one day, and were 
never sundered in any one church, and which never 

18 



202 INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 

came to be parted until the time when the apostoh'c prin-> 
ciple of morals, which had been so long superseded^ 
was recovered, and promulgated anew? Let the " well* 
omened " enterprise of the Oxford divines (so far as at 
present developed) be crowned with all the success they 
can desire, let the episcopal clergy generally, or univer- 
sally (which God forbid) yield themselves to the fond 
illusion, let the English church be hoisted up to the high 
mark of Nicene perfection, and, in order to make the 
experiment as complete as possible, let it repel from it- 
self so much of the interference of the civil power as 
distinguishes the English church under the Tudors, from 
the eastern church under Constantine, or Theodosius; 
all this effected, and the first flush of triumphant feel- 
ings subsided, and then every one would become con- 
scious of a want — a fault, which some would not hesitate 
to name; and there would be a general outcry for the de- 
ficient element of ancient Christianity; and a few months 
would see the " holy virginity" of the Nicene age, freed 
indeed from its grosser scandals, and sobered down a 
little by English good sense, fairly set a-going among usy 
and crowds, of both sexes, high-wrought by this fresh 
and specious enthusiasm, would profess themselves 
** the espoused of the Lord." That such things should 
come about, even in this country, and this age, I cannot 
think in any degree improbable.— -But are we indeed 
prepared to hail them? 

Besides the vehement propensity of all things to reach 
their deep and true afilnities, there is a very obvious ten- 
dency in the superstitious feeling and doctrine concern- 
ing the sacraments, to bring about the restoration of the 
celibate. If certain imaginative notions of sacredness 
and sanctity are but once well lodged in many minds, 



INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 203 

and especially in delicately sensitive minds, there comes 
in, at the same time, or it will soon develope itself, an 
instinctive necessity for carrying them out in all direc- 
tions; and in fact, until these morbid notions are so car- 
ried out, the conscience is troubled, and the moral senti- 
ments are kept on the rack, or are exposed to frequent 
and cruel shocks. There would not long be wanting 
some tender and devout spirits, nor some of more fana- 
tical temper, who would denounce, as insufferable, the 
desecration of *' Holy Baptism," and of the " Holy Eu* 
charist," by the hands of a married priest. Many, and 
among these, some of the most exemplary members of 
the church, would declare that their inmost nature re- 
volted at the thought of receiving the consecrated ele- 
ments from "polluted hands." A married priest! shall 
such a one touch that altar which archangels tremble 
even to look upon! (as says the blessed Chrysostom.) 
This may not be: too long indeed has the church, tram^ 
pled on by profane protestantism, submitted to these de- 
gradations. The time, however, is now come that she 
should raise herself from the dust, nor ever again per- 
mit her " present Lord " to be uplifted by any but hands 
washen in innocency, nor the steps of her tremendous 
altar to be trodden by any but those whose '♦ loins are 
girt about with truth." 

All this has actually been seen and heard in the church, 
and it will inevitably renew itself among ourselves, if 
only ancient Christianity is to be revived, and if Eng- 
land, abandoned by God for her sins, is to shut up the 
scriptures, to frown upon the gospel, and to take up, in 
the stead of it, the heartless " philosophy " of the pa^ 
eristic folios. 

'f be intimate connexion then of the celibate with al} 



204 INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 

parts of the ancient religions system, presents itself as 
a subject of urgent practical importance, at a time when 
the notions, rites, and doctrines, of that system, are re- 
commended as imbodying Christianity in its mature and 
most perfect form; and when, in a word, the Nicene 
church is solemnly lifted up, as the standard by wiiich 
every thing ecclesiastical should be estimated. 

This alleged connexion, fatal as it must be held to be 
to tfie pretensions of ancient Christianity, considered as 
a MODEL-SYSTEM, is not to be exhibited in generalities 
merely; but must be traced carefully, and on several 
lines of inquiry. This inquiry I am now to pursue, and 
with the hope of combining comprehensiveness and bre- 
vity, with a sufficient degree of distinctness in the de- 
tails, shall arrange the evidences I have to adduce under 
five heads, and shall consider the ancient religious ce- 
libacy, and the ascetic practices therewith connected, as 
affecting — 

I. The notions entertained of the Divine Nature, or 
the moral attributes of God-— 

II. The scheme of salvation^ — its means and end — 

III. The system of morals, in its principles, and ope^ 
ration on the church and society at large — - 

IV". The visible institutions of Christianity, and espe^ 
cially the sacraments — and, 

V. The ecclesiastical polity; and particularly the po- 
sition, influence, and temper of the clergy. 

In order to anticipate any objection, bearing upon my 
general argument, I must state the principle which I 
bind myself to observe in citing the evidence of writers 
of different times, embracing a period of four hundred 
years. — I assume, then, that the moment of the JNicene 
council is the centre point of historical inquiries, con- 



INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS. 205 

cerning ancient Christianity. It is so, first, because, by 
general acknowledgment, the church was altogether at 
that time in a more settled condition than at any other 
period, whether earlier or later. Secondly, because we 
are in possession of far more ample materials, relating 
to that period, than are extant belonging to any other, 
earlier or later, and, therefore, we may, with more cer- 
tainty and satisfaction, bring it under discussion; and 
thirdly, and especially, because this period has been ex- 
plicitly recognised, in the present controversy, as that 
wherein was imbodied the pure ideal of doctrine and dis- 
cipline, and which many -wish to consider as the model 
and standard of the English episcopal church. Here, 
then, is our resting-place; and in quoting earlier autho- 
rities, it is only just so far as these preceding writers 
may be fairly taken as having laid the foundations of the 
Nicene church; or, on the other hand, if later doctors 
are brought forward, it will be when they, as plainly, 
are seen to be completing the building, and laying stone 
upon stone, after the original plan, and in manifest con- 
formity with the mind and purpose of their predecessors. 
Thus, for example, if Origen, Irenaeus, or the apostolic 
bishops are produced, it will be so far as they were the 
fathers of the Nicene Christianity; or, if I come down 
so low as to the times of Gregory the Great, I shall ad- 
duce his evidence, not as the father of popery, but as the 
child and scholar of the Nicene doctors. 

In fact, I think there are very few points of differ- 
ence, distinguishing the Nicene church, from either ihe 
earlier or the later church, within the compass of two 
hundred years, on either side, which modern contro- 
vertists, of any clasa, would much care to insist upon, 
as of material consequence to their particular opinions. 

18* 



206 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

It is well, however, to cast anchor at some one point, 
and manifestly the early years of the fourth century af- 
ford the hardest bottom for this purpose. The extant, 
and principal, writers of the period during which Ni- 
cene Cliristianity may be considered as having remained 
entire and unchanged, are barely so many as twenty. 
The works, however, of several of these are voluminous, 
and they altogether furnish -an amount of various and ex- 
act information, concerning the opinions and usages of 
the time, such as is hardly surpassed in copiousness, or 
exactness, by the historic materials of any but the most 
recent times. At least it is enough to exclude the ap- 
prehension of our being liable to fall into any material 
error, in representing, either the notions, or the prac- 
tices, or the spiritual and moral characteristics of the 
period. 



I. Connexion of the ancient celibate with the no- 
tions ENTERTAINED OF THE DIVINE NATURE. 

It is affirmed, then, that the fundamental principle and 
the practices of religions celibacy were at once the pro- 
duct, and the indication, of certain notions concerning 
llie Divine Nature, altogether unlike those conveyed in 
the scriptures, and which took effect upon every other 
element of ancient Christianity. 

Few, I suppose, will deny that a stanch orthodoxy 
may consist, and has often in fact consisted, not merely 
with incidental errors, but with very unworihy and de- 
lusive conceptions of the Divine Nature. How many 
vehement assorters of Athanasian doctrine have appeared 
sjn the stage of the church, whose notions of the moral 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 207 

sltribntes of God, or of what (with reverence) may be 
called the divine dispositions, were of no better quality 
that such as may have been entertained by the visionaries 
of the Ganges, of the Indus, of the Euphrates, or of the 
Nile! This fact, instructive as it is, cannot escape the 
notice of any intelligent reader of church history. An 
orthodoxy, logically precise, has served, with many an 
ardent spirit, as the blind of a most corrupt theology; 
and the Athanasian creed has been used as a mantle, 
wrapping round the illusive principles of the oriental 
theosophy. But, in such instances, and they have been 
very numerous, although the concealed error may elude 
our grasp, while we are in search for it in its dogmatic 
form, it never fails to betray itself, somewhere, among 
the characteristics of the ethical or ecclesiastical system 
of the parties in question. 

This is remarkably the case in the instance now be- 
fore us; and after we have traced the Christian celibate 
institution, very satisfactorily, as we may think, to this, 
that, and the other external cause, and have pursued it, 
historically, up to its several sources, when we come to 
institute a deeper inquiry regarding its inner cause, or 
primary motive, we have hardly advanced a step before 
we meet unquestionable indications of its real import as 
a product of that gnostic sentiment which, even where 
the gnostic heresies were the most strenuously resisted, 
held possession of the religious mind, almost universally, 
along the shores of the Mediterranean, and during a full 
seven hundred years. 

I here anticipate a brisk and resentful retort on the 
part of the champions of ancient Christianity, who, at 
the mere mention of any such '* calumnious insinuation," 
ayill triumphantly appeal to the illustrious catena patrum, 



208 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

who, from age to age, stood as the bulwarks of the 
faith, and gave their whole souls to the work of repelling 
the gnostic heresiarchs. The well-merited eulogium of 
these worthies on this particular ground, I would be for- 
ward to assent to, and to repeat. But, when this justice 
has been rendered to the anti-gnostic fathers, from Ire- 
naeus to Theodoret, a more exact attention to the facts, 
and a more calm consideration of them, will lead us to 
admit the necessity of observing a distinction, often 
overlooked, between the formal and zealous opposition 
which men may make to certain definite errors, and the 
latent and unconfessed entertainment given to the very 
feelings out of which those errors have sprung. As 
there is what may be called articulate truth and inarti- 
culate truth, and as multitudes, no doubt, have been 
saved by their participation of the latter, who have either 
not known, or who might even have resisted the for- 
mer; so is it with error, and w4th its influence over the 
mind. More than a few, in every age, have stood fore- 
most in the assault upon error, as defined and broadly 
pronounced by heretics, who, at the same time, have ma- 
nifestly been themselves the victims of the false senti- 
ment — the intimate illusion, whence that error has taken 
its rise. Thus, for example, in our own times, has it 
not happened, and, in some signal instances, that the 
assailants of skepticism have afforded indications enough 
of their suffering, themselves, under that ague of the 
soul? 1 consider it, therefore, neither as a calumnious 
imputation, nor as a philosophical refinement, to affirm, 
that the early church, while employed in meritoriously 
and successfully repelling the proteus gnosticism by 
which, from the first, it was beleaguered, did itself ad- 
mit, and to a much greater extent than has often been 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 309 

supposed, a deep gnostic feeling, which made itself felt 
in every branch of its doctrinal and ecclesiastical con- 
stitution. 

Apart from an acquaintance with the history of that 
awful mistress of the ancient world — the oriental the- 
osoPHY which, under a thousand changeful colours, held 
the religious mind in thrall during a period of two thou- 
sand years — ^apart from this history, we are neither qua- 
lified duly to estimate the divine excellence and purity 
of the Christian system, nor to render full justice to the 
orthodox early writers on account of their resistance of 
this captivating illusion, nor can we resolve the enigma 
of the superstitions which, even while repelling gnosti- 
cism, the ancient church admitted. In this last respect, 
especially, it is the knowledge of gnosticism, not indeed 
as a heresy, but as a feeling, and as the " tyrant of the 
cavern " — the lurking witchery of the human spirit, that 
must afford us the clue we want in clearing a path through 
the labyrintli of ancient Christianity. It is to this gnos- 
tic feeling, preoccupying all minds, religiously disposed, 
that we must trace most of those peculiarities of senti- 
ment and practice which make up the striking contrast 
between the apostolic and the Nicene church. This 
oriental theosophic sentiment consisted in, and produced 
a fatal misapprehension of, the Divine nature, or moral 
attributes of God, and its consequence was to give a 
totally wrong directioh to every thing in theology or in 
worship, that might come within its reach. 

Gnosticism, repelled by the ancient church, and at 
length (by fair, as well as foul means) finally extirpated, 
as a visible heresy, did not expire until after it had de- 
posited myriads of its eggs within the vitals of the church. 
Cinosticism surviving in principle, and polytheism in ri' 



210 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

tual, make up together the bastard religion of the middle 
ages, otherwise called popery. The protestant churches 
have indignantly shaken off the grosser elements of this 
superstition, that is to say the poly tlieism of popery; but 
they have not, or not all, even to the present day, alto- 
gether dispelled the more occult and refined element, 
namely — the gnosticism of popery: and to speak the 
plain truth, it is nothing else than this same element, this 
inveterate gnostic feeling, that is now rising to the sur- 
face in the Oxford divinity. 

The identity of this occult element, working under 
so many forms, and during the lapse of so many centu- 
ries, and struggling on from east to west, like a pesti- 
lence, born in the mud of the Ganges, and spreading 
death to the shores of the Atlantic, becomes manifest 
when we keep the eye fixed upon certain of its constant 
characteristics. These therefore demand our closest 
attention. 

We are much accustomed to think of the ancient 
gnosticism, in a trivial manner, and only as we find it 
grotesquely and hastily portrayed in modern books, 
where it appears as an unintelligible congeries of puerile 
absurdities, or a mere jargon, saved from contempt, only 
by that daring impiety of its language which excites our 
resentment. Not such was it in fact; nor as such did it 
gather to itself, and fascinate the intellectual masses of 
the ancient world; — these masses too, led on by minds 
as vigorous and as lofty as any that have figured in phi- 
losophy. In forming our notion of this system we must 
allow for the disadvantages we labour under, first, as 
having to collect our materials entirely from among the 
fragments which its triumphant opponents have chosen 
to hand down for our inspection; and secondly, as view* 



WITH THE NICJENE THEOLOGY* 211 

ing the whole in the light of a much better understood 
Christianity; and thirdly, which is no inconsiderable 
circumstance, as having ourselves undergone that severe 
training in the demonstrative and physical sciences, 
which impels us to regard with cold contempt whatever 
cannot make good its claims to respect on the ground of 
direct evidence, or logical inference. But to the mind 
of antiquity, the mere want of positive proof, far from 
being regarded as a disparagement, constituted the pecu- 
liar charms of a scheme of philosophy. The best praise 
of a system of theosophy was, that it soared far above 
the region of cold demonstration, and that it opened a 
fair field of lofty and delicious speculations, exempt from 
the impertinent interference of dry dialectic methods of 
argument. The ancient mind chose its religion, as a vo- 
luptuary chooses a mistress, not for her probity, but her 
beauty, to his eye; and it desired, not what could not be 
gainsayed, but what was too fair to be rudely questioned. 
Gnosticism, all gratuitous as it was, and rich in a gor- 
geous pneumatology, on this very account captivated the 
meditative, the excursive, and the pensive orders of 
minds; because it dared to unfold an upper world, which 
could be conversed with only by a spiritual intuition, 
disdaining the trammels of reason. 

Gnosticism, such as we find it westward of the Syrian 
deserts, or the Euphrates, and such as it appeared from 
the apostolic age, and the times of Philo, and four cen- 
turies onward, was at once the effort of that instinct of 
the human mind which impels it to penetrate the mys- 
teries of the invisible world, from mere curiosity; and 
it was the struggle of the heart, as well as the reason; 
it was its agony under the pressure of those indefinite 
Burmises that spring from a contemplation of the actual 



213 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

condition of the human system — its derangement, its- 
anarchy, and its corruption, and which painful emotions 
seek repose in such a notion of the Supreme Being as 
compromises the moral, by the means of a refinement of 
the natural attributes. Gnosticism reaches its end, when 
it has fashioned a deity allied to the imagination, not to 
the conscience. 

Under many variations which, during the course of 
several centuries, gave some new aspect to the system, 
almost every year, these same germinating impulses are 
always perceptible. But it is to be observed, and the 
observation affords a clue to many of the perplexities of 
the subject, that, although the first of these motives, 
namely, that imaginative curiosity which gave birth to 
the rich theories of gnosticism, seemed always to lead 
the way, and to be mistress of the whole, it was in fact 
the second impulse, less ostensible, but far more potent, 
namely, the agonizing desire to resolve, or to dismiss the 
problem of moral and natural evil, as disturbing the 
governmentof an Infinite being; it was this impulse which 
really controlled the apparently lawless speculations that 
sprung from the first: and in truth, the last and ripened 
form of gnosticism — Manicheism, was only the outbreak 
of that force which, during centuries, had been inly 
heaving the mass. The bold doctrine broached by 
Manes, of a personal, independent, and an eternal evil 
principle, waging an interminable war with the good, 
was only a simplification of the system, brought out, at 
the last, by that pressure which was threatening its de- 
struction. Gnosticism, less vehemently urged by the 
catholic church — the politically powerful church, might 
long have continued, as at first, a splendid speculation: 
but thus compelled to make a desperate effort, it became^ 

7 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 213 

a malignant heresy, and as such, offered itself the more 
fairly, as a victim, to its triumphant rival. 

In the gnosticism of the times of Phiio, the brighter 
and purer element only appeared on the surface; while 
in the gnosticism of Manes and his successors, the darker 
and the more foul prevailed; but inasmuch as neither 
was at any time altogether wanting, so both, while ex- 
plicitly and earnestly condemned by the church, never- 
theless deeply affected its opinions, its moral sentiments, 
and its practices. It is this unconfessed, and yet exten- 
sive and permanent influence of gnosticism upon ancient 
Christianity,* that resolves the enigmas of church his- 
tory, and indeed affords a key to the difficulties which-, 
at the present moment, distract so many minds. 

What then was the essence of this oriental theosophy, 
as distinguished from the genuine theology that had been 
handed down, through the inspired patriarchs, to the 
Jewish legislator, and by him sent forward, in the hands 
of the prophets, and finally given to the world in its 
perfect form by our Blessed Lord, and his apostles? 
This theosophy, scarcely less ancient than the patri- 
archal piety, and much more widely extended, was to 
this effect — That the visible world, with its material ele- 
ments, jarring one upon another, and its organized and 
animated orders, perishable, and corruptible, and inimi- 
cal, and its intelligent races, degenerate and wretched, 
is altogether unworthy of the Supreme and Infinite 
Power, or as he was called — the Father Unknown, who, 
nevertheless, is the emanative source of minds, human 
and angelic, or at least of the purer classes of minds. — 

* Matter (Histoire critique du Gnosticisme,) is far from being 
satisfactory on this branch of his general subject, and seems bar^" 
ly conscious of its importance. 

19 



214 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

That lliis material world was, in fact, the work of infe- 
rior and imperfect beings, (or of one such being,) them- 
selves removed by many stages of filiation from the 
Supreme Deity, and who exercised an ill-fated and pre- 
carious empire over this troubled sphere, where man — 
unhappy man, finds his present lot to be cast, who, 
nevertheless, if he steadily pursue his better destiny, 
shall at length, and after long periods of trial and purga- 
gation, and under the conduct of the Logos-Redeemer, 
reascend to his source, and merge his being for ever in 
the boundless ocean of light and life. 

It was a side principle of the gnostic theosophy, a 
principle at the first advanced for the purpose of op- 
posing the Christian church, and abandoned only when 
conciliation became necessary, that Jehovah, the god of 
the Jews, was not the Supreme Deity, but, on the con- 
trary, his foe, and the usurper of his power. 

To this system, Christianity opposed itself, not simply 
by maintaining its orthodoxy, but more specifically, first, 
by vindicating the constitution of the visible world, what- 
ever partial disorders it might seem to embrace, as the 
work of the Supreme Wisdom and Goodness — wisely 
leaving speculative difficulties, or apparent inconsisten- 
cies unsolved; secondly, by connecting itself with the 
Jewish dispensation; and here again, leaving untouched 
whatever might offend the captious in the Jewish history 
or poetry; thirdly, by exhibiting the Supreme Being, as 
standing in an immediate and gracious relationship to 
man; and as the antagonist, neither of matter, nor of 
the visible world, nor of what is simply finite and cor- 
ruptible, but as the enemy of that only which is morally 
evil. This last w^as practically the chief point of con- 
trast between Christianity and gnosticism. The one 
system spoke of God as hating nothing that he had made, 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 215 

and hating sin only, which he had not made. Nothing 
therefore intervened between God and man, nothing 
could intercept the full tide of blessedness, flowing from 
the Creator toward the creature, nothing but sin: sin re- 
moved, and sin renounced, and then the ineffable com- 
munion between the Infinite, and the finite, was restored, 
securing the glory of the former, and the felicity of the 
latter. But in the other system, the antithesis of the In- 
finite Perfection was — the finite and corruptible m.aterial 
world, of which one of the mere accidents (and man's 
sad misfortune) was moral disorder, or sm. The course 
therefore to be pursued by man, in extricating himself 
from his luckless position, and in getting clear of its ac- 
cident — sin, was, by lofty contemplation, by habitual 
mental abstraction, and by disengaging himself, as far as 
possible, from the humiliathig conditions of animal life, 
to facilitate, and, in a sense, to anticipate, his relapse 
into the infinite Nature. 

Such w^ere the two confronted religious systems. 
Need it be asked which is the true, the divine, and which 
is the illusory, the false? Who can now balance between 
the two? The catholic church opposed its substantial 
truths to these baseless and malignant speculations, and 
triumphed; but alas, it fell in triumphing, and while vi- 
gorously repelling the openly pronounced and more dis- 
tinct forms of the gnostic delusion, it too soon, and at a 
very early period, yielded itself to the undefined and the 
more seductive gnostic principle^ which made the con- 
ditions of animal life, and the common alliances of man 
in the social system, the antithesis of the divine perfec- 
tions, and so to be escaped from, and decried, by all 
who panted after the highest excellence. It was this 
gnostic leaven, which through the medium of some ar- 
dent minds, gained at length a firm hold of the Chris- 



216 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

tian community, and became the germinating cause of 
so much of the ascetic institution as was not expiatory, 
as well as of many of those superstitions which have 
continued to oppress Christianity, even to the present 
time. 

None, it is true, who retained their connexion with 
the catholic church, or who were recognised by it as its 
members, allowed themselves to speak of sin in gnostic 
language, or ever openly renounced, or altogether over- 
looked, the characteristic Christian doctrine of holiness, 
as the end of the Christian life; but at the same time 
there were exceedingly few who hesitated to surren- 
der themselves to what I have termed the gnostic feel- 
ing, in relation to the vulgar conditions of man's 
present state; and while the feeble and flickering en- 
thusiasm of gnosticism itself was found to be avail- 
ing only with a very small class, in carrying them 
forward on the thorny path of abstraction and asceti- 
cism, and while it left the majority to amuse themselves 
with the system as a barren speculation, it was far other- 
wise with the Christian body, among whom there were 
at work motives far more animating, and better defined, 
and more than sufficient for giving practical efficacy to 
the very same principle of abstraction, and which im- 
pelled multitudes to abandon their position in society, 
until, in fact, the wilderness became peopled with soli- 
taries, and the church was converted into a sort of thea- 
tre for the athletae of the higher spiritual economy. 

Gnosticism had its avatar, its -3!^on deliverer, its 
Christos, and Logos, who, sent down to this lower 
sphere by the Unknown Father, to oppose and expel the 
Demiurge Creator, and god of this world, and the Jeho- 
vah of the Jews, was to recall the pneumatici — the purer 
minds of the human family, to their original place in the 
intellectual system. But gnosticism had no vicarious 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 217 

Saviour, no Lamb of God taking away the sin of the 
world — no propitiatory death on the cross: — its Christos 
did not suffer when the man, Jesus, was crucified by 
Pilate. It had no such Saviour, nor wanted one; for it 
<lid not recognise sin and guilt as the real obstacles in 
the way of nian's felicity. Only let the human spirit 
break away from the material thralls of the creator of 
this gross system, and it would instantly be happy: mat- 
ter, vyn^ being dropped, sin, its accident, would fall 
with it. 

The ancient church felt the infinite superiority of its 
own system of belief; and its constancy, in maintaining 
its ground, beleaguered as it w^as by errors so insidious 
and fascinating, may well claim our admiration. But 
how insidious and how fascinating are those errors that 
spring up in the human mind as the substitutes for long- 
lost sacred truths! Moreover, to aim at, and to reach in 
religion, something better, or something more exalted 
and refined than that which God himself has granted to 
us, seems, to fiery and ambitious spirits, not merely in- 
nocent, but laudable. Why may we not lift sanctity (at 
least for tlie few,) to a higher level than that of the cold 
avoidance of positive sin? Why may not man aspire to 
be holy after the fashion of seraphs? Alas! this loftier, 
or seraphic sanctity, is not sanctity; but a factitious pie- 
tism, involving the substitution of principles fundamen- 
tally false, in the place of the motives of genuine virtue. 
80 it was, that the unearthly holiness which the ancient 
church from an early period, made the object of its fond 
ambition, was not Christian holiness, but mere gnostic 
abstraction from the innocent conditions of animal life. 
Christianity teaches that a near approach to the Father 
of spirits was to be sought for on the path of that virtue 
which is opposed to vice. Gnosticism held out the hope 

19* 



218 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

of such an approximation by mere disengagement from 
matter, and from its corruptibility. The ancient church 
never denied the Christian doctrine of sanctity; but it as- 
sumed along with it, and as a useful subsidiary princi- 
ple, the gnostic doctrine: — hence its asceticism, and espe- 
•cially its doctrine of the angelic excellence of virginity. 

When will the church, once for all, convince itself of 
the great truth, so amply confirmed by its own history, 
that, to tamper, in any way, with the first principles of 
religion, or to attempt to exalt and refine them, is an en- 
deavour not more impious, than it is fatal? The en- 
deavour to elevate and rectify Christianity, has, in fact, 
proved to be of w^orse, or of more permanent ill con- 
sequence, than the endeavour to lower its requirements; 
for the latter attempt has involved only a relaxation of 
principles, while the former has demanded a substitu- 
tion of one principle for another, and has therefore de- 
ranged every thing else. 

Whenever we are considering the ancient Christian 
asceticism, it is indispensable that we should keep in 
view the difference between what was purely abstrac- 
tive, and what was penitential or punitive, in its princi- 
ples or practices. This distinction, if not always clearly 
defined in the monastic writings, is always easy to be 
observed when the sentiments of the ascetics are ana- 
lyzed. And it is farther to be noted, that, while in some 
places, and at certain periods, the abstractive principle, 
prompting to the withdrawment of the spiritual being 
from the conditions of animal life, was chiefly thought 
of, in other places, and at other times, the self-torment- 
ing, penance-doing doctrine took most effect, and pro- 
duced those macerations and inflictions, by means of 
which sin might be expiated, and tlie future reckoning 
rendered so much the less formidable. The fact is, at 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 219 

least, a curious instance of coincidence, (if it be nothing 
more,) that the chief centres of gnosticism were also 
the localities where the abstractive species of asceticism 
made itself prominent; while in the west, where gnos- 
ticism, until a late period, was only an imported doc- 
trine, the penitential, or rather expiatory asceticism, pre- 
vailed over the abstractive. Of this alleged fact, it would 
be easy, if pertinent to our present argument, to adduce 
many striking illustrations. 

Now, keeping in mind the above stated broad distinc- 
tion, I presume it will be universally admitted among 
protestants^ that the existence, at any time, or in any 
community, of penitential and expiatory ascetic prac- 
tices, affords a sufficient and unquestionable proof of a 
corresponding compromise of that first principle of 
Christianity — the full and free pardon of sin, through 
the expiatory and vicarious sufferings of Him who was 
"made a sin-offering for us." Under whatever subter- 
fuges he may attempt to hide his error, the man who la- 
bours to expiate his own sin, by self-inflicted pains of 
the body, has lost his hold of the gospel of the grace of 
God: he may be very devout, and very fervent, but the 
gospel he has framed to himself, is " another gospel," 
and, in fact, is no gospel; it is not " glad tidings," but 
sad tidings. 

Then in adherence to the very same criterion of truth, 
we at once say, that the existence, and the general pre- 
valence, in any church, of the principles, and practices 
of abstractive asceticism, and especially of the doctrine 
concerning the angelic excellence of virginity, is to be 
held as sufficient proof of a corresponding compromise 
of the genuine Christian notion of the divine nature, in 
its moral and spiritual attributes, and plainly indicates 
the substitution of the gnostic idea of a deity eternally 



•220 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

at war with matter, and abhorring the conditions, and 
resenting the humiliations of animal life, in the place of 
the scripture doctrine concerning the divine holiness, 
and hatred of sin. 

If then the serious imputation now thrown upon the 
ancient church of having, while steadfast in its ortho- 
doxy, admitted the germinating principle of the gnostic 
theosophy, and of having, so far, compromised the glory 
of Christian theology, if this imputation were repelled, 
and if proof in support of it were demanded, nothing 
more need be done in justification of such an impeach- 
ment, than merely to refer to the unquestioned fact, that, 
from the first, and thence onward through the track of 
centuries, it adopted, and extensively acted upon, the gnos- 
tic principle — That the highest order of sanctity, or in 
truth the only genuine and perfect sanctity, attainable on 
earth, is in the possession of those who withdraw them- 
selves, as far as possible, from the conditions of animal 
life, and especially, who renounce and abrogate, in their 
own persons, the sexual constitution. Religious celiba- 
cy, such as we find it in the ancient church, was not an 
expiatory sacrifice, it was not a penance; but an act of 
abstraction, or an abduction of the incarcerated soul from 
the v?.}i, the dregs and stuff of the lower world^ by means 
of which separation it placed itself just so much the 
nearer to God, as it was the more remote from the natu* 
ral life. 

This is the doctrine of gnosticism, of its parent soof- 
feeisrn, of its grand-parent buddhism, and of the ascetic 
institute of the ancient church. Almost in the very lan- 
guage, often in the very language of the gnostic teachers, 
and even while formally condemning the system, as an 
Anti-Christian heresy, do the Christian writers, and es- 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 221 

pecially those of the eastern and Alexandrian churches, 
recommend virginity, and speak of it as the only near 
approximation which man can make to the deity, and as 
a forestalling of the soul's emancipation from the slavery 
and degradation of its connexion with matter, and with 
animal life. Whence came the notion universally pre- 
valent in the church, and repeated by a thousand tongues, 
that the virgins of Christ, male and female, constituted 
a spiritual aristocracy, or a choir of terrestrial angels, 
and who, as such, were holy by emphasis, holy as a 
class, and waiting only the kind hand of death, to lift 
them up to the throne of God? All this, in its various 
colours of extravagance, came not from the apostles, nor 
is it to be traced to the scriptures: — it is nothing but sheer 
gnosticism, and it means nothing less than the removing 
"the Father" revealed to men "by the Son," and the 
putting in his place the Trctruft ayvao-rocy a being approached 
only by the few — the ^v&viJiATijcot, who had withdrawn 
themselves from the laws of the lower world, and had 
made common cause with him as the enemy of the de- 
miurge creator. 

But can it be imagined that a compromise of first prin- 
ciples, so fatal as this, could come to its end simply in 
originating, and in keeping alive the institute of celiba- 
cy? Assuredly not; and it is nothing less than what we 
are compelled to look for, when we find that the same 
gnostic feeling, and theosophy, which, in the celibate 
institution, indicated its presence, and displayed its 
power, took effect also upon every other element and 
usage of ancient Christianity. Of this we shall discover 
evidence enough in the after stages of our inquiry. 

I do not, however, wish to stop short where I fairly 
might, at this mere reference to the ancient abstractive 



222 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

asceticism, as a suflicient proof of the prevalence of the 
gnostic theosophy and sentiment, in the ancient church, 
but will adduce a few passages, which, although they can 
by no means convey the irresistible impression made 
upon an unprejudiced mind, by the general tenor of* the 
ancient church divinity, may yet serve as sufficient sam- 
ples of this sort of compromised Christianity. 

Who is to be accounted orthodox, if Athanasius be 
not so? nor only orthodox, but truly good and great; 
and, by his wisdom and courage, more worthy, if we 
may accept the arbitration of Gibbon, to have sat on the 
throne of the Csesars, than either of his contemporary 
imperial enemies. And yet this great Athanasius was 
himself not more exempt than the craziest fanatic of his 
times, from that flimsy ascetic notion of sanctity, which 
sprang from the gnostic notion of the divine nature. The 
follies of an inferior mind may, in any case, be imputed; 
if we please, to the individual, but those of eminently 
powerful minds must rather be thrown back upon the 
age, and they may safely be assumed as its characteris- 
tics. The vigorous and straightforward understanding 
of this unbending cliampion of the faith, could hardly 
have failed to have broken through the illusions of the 
times, had those illusions been of an incidental kind; 
but they had arisen steadily and slowly from deep-seat- 
ed false theological principles, they had pervaded the 
Christian community, from the east lo the west, they had 
acquired, by long and undisturbed domination, an autho- 
rity such as none (or very few) dared to call in question, 
so that the most devout and enero^etic minds made it 
their glory to promote, and would have thought it a sa- 
r.rilege to have examined, the venerable errors. Willing- 
ly should we give so estimable a man the benefit of any 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 223" 

doubt that may be thought to attach to certain tracts, 
usually comprehanded in his works; but little or nothing 
could be gained, for his reputation, by this scrupulosity, 
inasmuch as those of his writings, the genuineness of 
which has never been questioned, contain sentiments 
fully equivalent to what may be found in those which, 
on this ground, we might hesitate to cite as his. The 
apology addressed to Constantius may be appealed to 
confidently, as genuine, and in this piece Athanasius uses a 
style, when adverting to the subject of religious virgini- 
ty, which bears out any thing elsewhere occurring in the 
works imputed to him. The expressions applied to our 
Lord in this tract are far too much in the gnostic style, 
and startle the ear by their resemblance to the language 
of the gnostic leaders in speaking of their '*Logos-Ke- 
deemer." " The Son of God," says Athanasius, (torn. 
i. page 698,) " made man for us, and having abolished 
death, and having liberated our race from the servitude of 
corruption, hath, besides his other gifts, granted to us to 
have upon earth an image of the sanctity of angels, 
namely, virginity. The maids possessing this (sancti- 
ty) and whom the church catholic is wont to call the 
brides of Christ, are admired, even by the gentiles, as 
bein<>" the temple of the Logos, eeg vctov ova-ag rov xoyov. No* 
where, truly, except among us Christians is this holy 
and heavenly profession fully borne out or perfected; so 
that we may appeal to this very fact as a convincing 
proof that it is among us that true religion is to be 
found." 

And thus, in the undoubted tract of the same father, 
on the Incarnation, we meet the very same prominent doc- 
trine, spoken of as a characteristic of the Christiaii sys- 
tem, and even including the gnostic phrase, applied to 



224 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

virginity, that it was an excellence obeying a rule "above 
law." *' Who is there, but our Lord and Saviour Christ, 
that has not deemed this virtue (of virginity) to be ut- 
terly impracticable (or unattainable) among men; and 
yet he has so shown his divine power, as to impel youths, 
as yet under age, to profess it, a virtue beyond law?" 
fTom. i. p. 105.) We cannot, therefore, do Athanasius 
much wrong in attributing to him sentiments which, even 
if they did not actually flow from his pen, are entirely 
in accordance with his opinions, as elsewhere professed. 
And yet it does not appear that the tract on virginity, or 
the ascetic life, is, on any sufficient grounds, assumed 
not to be genuine. Let it, however, be taken only as a 
sample of the temper and style of the times; — ^just as 
we say of the Alhanasian creed, that, whether it be the 
composition of this champion of orthodoxy, or not, it 
truly expresses his know belief, and that of the church 
of his titnes. If the individual reputation of Athanasius 
were the point now in question, then the genuineness of 
a particular tract, attributed to him, would be a point es- 
sential to our argument; but not so when it is the cha- 
racter of the age, rather than of the man, which we are 
considering. 

Now, looking at the tract I have mentioned, as a whole, 
and comparing it broadly with the apostolic writings, one 
cannot but instantly and strongly feel that the writer's 
notions of Christian sanctity, and those of the apostles, 
were almost totally dissimilar; but then these notions 
differ just in the same way as the gnostic idea of a deity 
abhorring the conditions of animal life, and at war with 
the visible world, differs from the Christian idea of the 
true God, the Creator of the world, and hating nothing 
but sin. I might stop to notice the utterly unapostoUc 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 225 

Style in which the author, in this treatise, commends 
the virtue of lasting. '* What doth Christ require of 
thee, but only a pure heart, and a body unsoiled, and 
made black and blue with fasting?" How much better 
were it for us to fall back from Christianity, such as this, 
upon the Jewish prophets, one of whom gives us a far 
more Christian-like, as well as a more rational reply to a 
similar question — ■'' What doth the Lord thy God require 
of thee, but — to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk 
humbly with thy Godl" Can we be at any loss in 
choosing between two systems of morality, as thus sum- 
marily expressed? What would not fasting do? — every 
thing, says Athanasius, and '* place man near to the 
throne of God." Yes, to the "god unknown" of gnos- 
ticism; but not to the God revealed in ihe scriptures. 
Athanasius, and the church of his time, did not altogether 
overlook, much less did they deny, what was substan- 
tial in morals; but they constantly associated with these 
weighty matters, that factitious sanctity which, when- 
ever so associated, has not failed to draw to itself the at- 
tention of ordinary minds, and,, in the end, to reduce its 
companion to a subordinate and almost forgotten place. 
Tell the mass of men, as solemnly as w^e please, that 
they must be *' holy in life and heart," and also — scru^ 
pulous in their external purifications, and we shall soon 
find them absorbed in the details of this scrupulosity, 
while they make light of justice, truth, mercy, and pu^ 
rity, as well as piety. It would be of no avail there- 
fore, in relation to our present argument, ta cite, from 
the same tract, the many excellent moral precepts which 
it imbodies: — the question is — With what are these pre- 
cepts associated, and what are the notioui?, concerning 
the divine nature, which must have been suggested by 
the general tenor of the writer's exhortations? 

20 



^26 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

Now let it for a moment be imagined, that some lead- 
ing religious writer, of the present day, and one of high 
reputation for intelligence and personal sanctity, as well 
as vigour of character, addresses a letter of religious 
advice and encouragement, to a devout Christian lady of 
his acquaintance, and that, among other advices, excel- 
lent as they may be, and in one and the same tone 
of serious intentness, this writer presumes to enter her 
chamber, in the capacity of her spiritual director, and 
"when there, gives her precise and solemn instructions, as 
to the cautions she should use in performing her ablu- 
tions, and the reserves she should adhere to in changing 
her linen! — no such insufferable impertinence could pos- 
sibly be fallen into by any one, gifted with a particle of 
common sense, in these days. No where, scarcely in 
the Romish communion, could we find a spirit so mise- 
rably enthralled by superstition, as to be led to make the 
ceremonials of the foot-bath an awful matter of piety, or 
to imagine that He who indigiiantly contemned the scru- 
pulous ablutions of the pharisee, was to be either pro- 
pitiated, or offended, by a lady's using, or not using, 
both her hands in washing her face! (Alhan. torn. i. p. 
1050.) I scorn to translate this page: Does it most excite 
contempt or indignation? 

How is it then that, at a time when the church had 
gathered to itself all the intelligence and learning of the 
age, a venerable archbishop, and a man of strong under- 
standing, and every way of eminent quality, should think 
it a proper part of his duty, in addressing the Christian 
ladies of his charge, to descend to topics so degrading, 
nay, so incredibly offensive? How is it that, in connex- 
ion with the changing of an inner vestment, such a man 
could bring himself to adduce the most solemn motives 
of piety? No other answer can be given to so perplex- 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 227 

ing a question but this — that, in the age of the holy 
Athanasius, the church universal had fallen into notions 
of the divine nature far more nearly allied to gnosticism 
than to apostolic Christianity; and in fact, that, while 
the gnostic heresy was denounced by the lips, the gnos- 
tic theosophy had sunk into the heart. With our Lord's 
pointed reprobation of pharisaic formalism full before 
their eyes, these fathers of the church nevertheless stre- 
nuously taught that Christian piety, of the higher sort, 
mainly turned upon, or at least could not dispense with, 
bodily puritications, and external observances! 

A contrast has been drawn by several modern protest- 
^nt writers, between the apostles, and the early fathers, 
and the difference such a comparison holds out, is striking 
indeed. There is, however, another comparison which I 
do not remember to have seen formally instituted, and 
which offers points of diversity still more marked, as 
well as highly instructive. What I mean is the vast in- 
feriority of the Christian divines of the first five centu- 
ries, compared, as teachers of morals, with the Jewish 
prophets of ^ve hundred years, reckoning from David 
onward. A few words may sufiice for setting forth this 
very significant parallel.— The Mosaic law — a national 
institute, and temporary only, and intended to seclude 
the Jewish people from the nations around them, com- 
prised various observances of personal ceremonial sanc- 
tity, well called *' carnal ordinances." But the Chris- 
tian law, intended for all nations, and designed for perpe- 
tuity, drops every such ritual scrupulosity, and not 
merely drops the observances, but pointedly condemns 
any regard to them among Christians. The servile de- 
sire to Judaize Christianity, is warmly reprobated, as 
implying nothing else than a renunciation of the gospel. 
And yet, while such are the characteristics of the two 



228 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIfiATE 

systems, respectively, what are the actual characteristics 
of the teaching of those who stood forward as the ex- 
pounders of the one, and of the other, in the ages fol- 
lowing the two institutions? — most remarkable is the 
contrasted style of the Jewish prophets, and of the Chris- 
tian doctors, in this respect! and how irresistible is the 
confirmation it affords of our faith in the inspiration of 
the Jewish scriptures! 

Every intelligent reader of the Bible must have noticed 
the general fact, that the writers of the Old Testament, 
impelled, one and all, by an unconscious onward ten- 
dency, toward a brighter and a purer, as well as a more 
expansive system than the Mosaic, lay very little stress 
upon the personal and more servile observances of the 
national law; and, on the contrary, iijsist, with a manly, 
rational, and evangelic ardour, upon the great principles, 
and the unchanging requirements of justice, mercy, tem- 
perance, as well as upon the development of the more 
intimate principles of the spiritual life. What is the 
book of Psalms? is it a manual of monkery? What are 
the prophets? are they zealous sticklers for ablutions, 
and do they chafe and fret on points of the ascetic ritual? 
Are David and the prophets, as if by the impulse of an 
involuntary gravitation, working themselves down from 
the greater to the less, in matters of morality, and de- 
scending from the substance to the form, from the spiri- 
tual to the ritual? Nay indeed, such are not the charac- 
teristics of the inspired writers of the Old Testament; 
who are manifestly imbued with the spirit and the power, 
with the truth, the reason, of the apostles, although they 
did not enjoy the same light. 

But how is it with the early, and with the very best 
expounders of the Christian code — a code (as found in 
the New Testament) of truth and reality, opposed to 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 229 

lifeless ceremony, and abject superstition? The very 
characteristics which we have denied to the Jewish in- 
spired writers, are what present themselves on every 
page of the early Christian doctors. It is, strange to say, 
the expounders of Christianity — the teachers of the law 
of liberty, who are ever passing off from what is mo- 
mentous, to what is trivial in morality, and who seem, 
on all occasions, quite as solicitous about the forms, as 
they are about the substance of piety; and Vv^ho rarely, 
if ever, fail to mix, along with solid instructions, bear- 
ing upon Christian conduct, some repulsive ingredients 
of a servile superstition! I would fain ask those who 
are the best qualified to answer the question — whether it 
be not so Is it not, in a certain sense, true, that, if we 
were to expunge from the fathers the piere phraseology 
of the gospel, and were to insert these same phrases in 
the Old Testament scriptures, then every thing would 
seem to be in its place; as in a system chronologically 
developing itself? That is to say, the fathers might then 
appear the fit expounders of the Mosaic carnal institute; 
while the prophets, Christianized in their language mere- 
ly, might be accepted as the genuine successors of the 
apostles. Such an adjustment would seem to give the 
harmony of regular progression, and of continuity to 
the series of sacred literature, as it flows forward through 
fifteen centuries. On this ground I should be inclined 
to urge an opponent to confess that the very best of the 
writers of the Nicene age, say Chrysostom, Augustine, 
Basil, Ambrose, Jerome, and the Gregorys, fall far be- 
hind the Jewish prophets, as to the notions they convey 
of the benignity and the purity of the divine nature; and 
in the breadth of their moral systems, and in the respec- 
tive importance attached by them to the forms, and to 

20* 



230 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

the substance of devotion, as well as in the warmth, the 
expansion, the sublimity, and the energy of the religious 
sentiment by which they seem personally to have been 
animated. In a word, this must, I think, be acknow- 
ledged, that the wTiters of the ancient dispensation were 
such as those should be, who were looking onward to- 
ward the bright day of gospel splendour; while the ear- 
ly Christian doctors were just such as one might well 
expect to find those w^ho were looking onward toward 
that deep night of superstition which covered Europe 
during the middle ages. The dawn is seen to be gleam- 
ing upon the foreheads of the one class of writers; while 
a sullen gloom overshadows the brows of the other. 

Every feeling of rational piety would be outraged, 
were those not infrequent passages to be adduced in 
which the great divines of the fourth century, while la- 
bouring to set virginity " above all praise," endeavour 
to mix up the notions it involves, with the ineffable re- 
lationships of the Trinity, and, perhaps, in opposition 
to the gnostic notion of female aeons, or divinities, in 
pairs, attribute an accident of humanity to God himself. 
Much of this sort that meets the eye, in the fathers, 
must be left where it lies — and may it never find a trans- 
lator! But let those who would be warned of the dan- 
ger of running into frightful impieties when the reins 
are given to fanatical impulses, open Gregory Nyssen, 
TJipt UApBmoic, and look up and down, and especially at the 
second chapter, hegmmng a-wio-ioogyctpyi/iAiv. If we shudder, 
as we must, at the presumption of the gnostics, while 
they are describing the emanation of the pairs of aeons, 
male and female, from the Supreme Deity, can we regard, 
without indignant reprobation, the shameless audacity of a 
Christian writer, and a bishop, who dares to speak as 
Gregory Nyssen does of the relationship of the Eternal 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 231 

Father to the Eternal Son? If this be not gnostic theo- 
sophy, it is something worse; and assuredly it is not 
Christian theology. Better renounce Christianity, with 
the gnostics, than thus insult its most sacred truths, with 
Gregory Nyssen. In order to secure for the celibate all 
possible patronage, and the highest authority, this writer, 
designating our Lord by a phrase of gnostic origin, as 
T/jv Tniyyfv rug cL<p^dLf><n±Q^ insists upon the fact of his enter- 
ing the world in a manner implying a tacit disparage- 
ment of marriage; and, in another place, (Oration on 
Christmas day,) he does not scruple to adopt a foolish, 
but favourite tradition, concerning the Virgin Mary, the 
import of which is to secure her suffrage in support of 
the practice of vowing virginity in very childhood, a 
practice cruel in itself, and the occasion of the worst 
abuses of the monkish system. Joseph, we are assujed, 
by the authors and retailers of this legend, was pitched 
upon as a worthy man, who wouhi consent to take 
charge, for life, of the young virgin, (Mary,) in the os- 
tensible relationship of her husband, but really as the 
guardian of her innocence. And it is remarkable as an 
instance of theological infatuation, even with the sound- 
est minds, that the absurd story which Gregory Nyssen 
introduces, with some apology, as apocryphal, Augus- 
tine, a few years later, coolly alludes to, as if it were an 
authenticated fact; and, in his customary mode of atlc* 
nuated reasoning, labours to infer as much from the 
words of scripture. *' It is clear," says he, (De Sancu 
Virgitiitate,) *' that Mary had previously (ihat is, before 
the visit of the angel,) devoted herself to God, in invio- 
lable chastity; and, that she had been espoused to Jo- 
seph on this very condition; desponsata viro jusio, non 
violenter ablaturo, sed potius contra violentos custodituro, 
quod ilia jam voverat." And all this was to he affirmed 



232 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

and believed, in order that, as he says, Mary might 
^' furnish an example to holy nuns in all time to come!" 
But, to return for a moment to Gregory Nyssen, I 
will refer to the fifth chapter of the tract above men- 
tioned, as furnishing an example of that sort of gnosti- 
cized Christianity which was felt to be needed in giving 
support to the practices and sentiments universally adopt- 
ed by the church. The contrast, on this point, between 
apostolic and ancient Christianity is striking. Peter 
affirms that, "by the promises of scripture we are made 
partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the cor- 
ruption that is in the world, gv iTrtQv/uta. *' — a term which, 
in its canonical sense, implies always sin, not simple af- 
fection. But the writer now before us declares, that 
the only way of approach to the Deity, is on the path 
of abstraction from the affections of humanity, as con- 
nected with our animal and social state; and that the in- 
stitute of virginity has this very end in view, that we 
may the more efTectually withdraw ourselves from the 
entanglement of our mundane existence. Now, all this 
is sheer gnosticism. The gospel teaches men to deny 
imgodliness and worldly lusts; gnosticism taught, or 
would fain have tauglit its followers, to deny and to re- 
sent those humiliating conditions which the malignant 
or unwise demiurge — the Creator of this world had im- 
posed upon the human race; and thus, in substance, and 
often with a very near resemblance of language, speak 
the ancient promoters of asceticism. If the style of 
Gregory Nyssen, on subjects of this class, be compared 
with that of Mahometan dervishes, or of Persian sooffees, 
or of the Grecian stoics, or Pythagorians, or Platonists, 
or with that of the gnostics of his own times, it does not 
appear that any solid advantage can equitably be claimed 
for him. Call Nyssen a Christian father, and Epicietus 



With the nicene theology. 233 

St heathen philosopher, if you please, and let the church 
pay her homage to the former on the 9th of March, or 
on any other day, and let her reprobate the latter every 
day of the year; mean time, this I am sure of, that I 
could take many entire pages from both, and placing 
them, in their naked merits, before an acute and intelli- 
gent Christian reader, desiring him, from internal evi- 
dence alone, to endorse each quotation vi^ith the word 
Christian or Heathen^ and he would as often interchange 
these designations, as apply them truly. And I think, 
moreover, that no candid mind would refuse to acknow- 
ledge that the praise of good sense, genuine simplicity, 
and consistency, must, most decisively, be awarded to 
the dark pagan. 

" In order that we may," says Nyss^en, in th€ tract 
above referred to, *' with a clear eye, gaze upon the light 
of the intellectual universe, we must disengage ourselves 
from every mundane affection, and lay aside the feculence 
of the corporeal condition." Thus hav€ talked mystics 
of every sect, and in all ages, and, while dreaming about 
the ** divine nature," have totally lost sight of real piety 
and virtue. The mysticism of the fathers is distin- 
guished from that of others by a peculiar slang, which, 
unconsciously, they caught from the gnostic teachers, 
their contemporaries. 

There can hardly be a more gross illusion than that 
of supposing that some few Christian phrases, such as — 
*' our Saviour, Christ," or, '* through the grace of the 
Son of God," really avail to Christianize a page, a chap- 
ter, or a treatise, which, these naked phrases apart, we 
should never have surmised to have come from Christian 
lips. Nor are religious writings to be Christianized by 
the formal insertion, here and there, of a creed, nor by 
ihe inlaying of texts of scripture. A Christian writing 



234 COx\NEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

is a composition which breathes the spirit, and which is 
marked throiighont by the peculiar principles of the New 
Testament. Now, judged by this rule, I think several 
of the most noted of the fathers would be cashiered of 
their usurped honours, and set down, some way below 
the level of the better heathen writers. I fear this would 
be the fate of both the Gregorys — I mean Nyssen, just 
quoted, and the eloquent Nazianzen. 

For propagating their opinions more widely and rea- 
dily, the gnostic teachers had had recourse to the charms 
of verse; and, to supplant them on this ground, several 
of the fathers struck their lyres; among these, Ephraim, 
Synesius, and Nazianzen; but of what quality was the 
antidote they provided? Let us take some samples — 
Synesius by and by, Nazianzen at present. It seems to 
have been the belief of these w^riters that, to make the 
nearest possible approach to gnostic doctrine and lan« 
guage, while orthodoxy was saved, afforded the surest 
means of excluding the specious heresy. A mistaken 
notion, surely: but it is thus, that, while their opponents 
were ranting about the vileness of their body, and the 
sublimity of the endeavour to break away from its hu- 
miliations, a Christian bishop could follow on the same 
path, and say (Carmina lamhica) — 

•H TTctp^&vuct cT' gJCySctcr;? rev aaifxciTog. 

Where did Nazianzen learn any such doctrine as this? 
We can only reply — Where he learned such as the fol- 
lowing, and neither the one nor the other from the in- 
spired writings. 

*' Happy the course of those, the unmarried-blessed, 
who, (in this world,) having shaken off the flesh, are 
neare^r to the divine purity," 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOav. 235 

What teaching more delusive in its tendency, thaii 
tlie telling a company of persons that, because unmar- 
ried, they were " near to God." Gnostics taught no- 
thing more pernicious; nor any thing, practically, unlike 
this. They, or some of them, discouraged marriage, 
not merely because it involved distractions incompatible 
with the contemplative discipline; nor merely because it 
was an additional tie, connecting the soul with the body; 
but, because it was the means of carrying on that pro^ 
cess of ''linking spirits to flesh," which the demiurge 
had set a-going) despite of the Supreme, and which the 
Supreme Deity was labouring to bring to an end. Now, 
such notions being afloat, how does a Christian teacher 
seek to withstand them? By addressing *' a spouse of 
Christ" in language such as that of the exhortation, 
5r/)o? TrapQ^.vcv^, (tom. ii. p. 299,) not merely abounding 
with the very cant of gnosticism, about the agency or 
influence of matter, the commixture of natures, the har- 
mony of spirits, with the Supreme Spirit; but present- 
ing, in a distinct form, the gnostic doctrine that the 
Christos, the Logos, had descended into this world to 
abrogate the original sexual constitution, and to institute 
a more spiritual economy. Let the studious reader look 
to the whole, as it stands; and if he thinks that a florid 
writer's real opinions ought not to be inferred from his 
poetic efl'usions, he may compare, with the composition 
here mentioned, the following passage from our author's 
thirty-first oration, which ofl'ers the same gnostic jar- 
gon, and the same gnostic principles, mixed up, indeed, 
with a larger proportion of Christian phrases^—*' She 
who is under the yoke (of matrimony) is in part Christ's; 
but the virgin is Christ's wholly. The one, indeed, is 
not altogether bound to the world; but the other turns 
from the world altogether. That which is partial In the 



236 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

married, is entire with "the virgin. Thou hast chosen? 
the angelic life, and hast ranged thyself with those who 
are unyoked, (the angels,) tliat thou shouldst not be 
borne downward toward the flesh, that thou shouldst not 
be borne downward uc vxnv, that thou shouldst not, 
even while remaining unmarried, be wedded t« Ja«." 
This is the very style of the Alexandrian gnostics, and 
on the ground of this same notion of the wedding of 
some souls to matter — a humiliation from which others 
were exempt — Yalentinian distributed human spirits into 
tlie three ehisses, of the spiritual, the material, and thg 
physical. In truth, many passages of gnostic teachings 
reported by Origen, Clement of Alexandria, and Ire- 
naeus, want but a little revision to make them altogether 
of a piece with the rhapsodies of Christian divines, in 
recommending the ascetic life.* " How angelic is it to 
Ijead a life, not merely not flesliy,. hut far raised above 
the laws of nature herself J^^ Looking at language such 
as this, by itself, one must rather imagine it to have come 
from the Lips of the enthusiasts of the school of Simon 
Magus, than from those of a well-informed teacher of 
Christianity. If the people at large are taught that the 
highest perfection attainable by man in the present slate 
consists in, and is to be pursued by the means of, a di- 
vorce of the heaven-born soul from matter, whatever they 
may at other times be told to the contrary, they will in^ 
evilably hirm a notion of the divine purity, as being the 
antithesis rather of corporeity, than, of sin; and this no- 
tion, far more agreeable as it is to the unrenewed mind 
than the other; although it be more abstruse, will, in 
fact, give law to the whole of the religious system, of 

^ Some specimens of this sort will be found in a. note at the 
end qf this Number. 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 237 

which it is an element. The very allusion contained in 
the epithet applied by tlie writer now before us to God, 
whom he calls ''the only bridegroom of pure souls," 
(twentieth oration,) conjoined with the doctrine that ab- 
solute purity is to be attained only by those who renounce 
marriage, could not but have the effect of diverting the 
minds of ordinary Christians from a genuine and spi- 
ritual conception of the divine nature. This substituted 
notion is the very egg of gnosticism, and it has made it- 
self the parent of all superstition. 

Better doctrine than this is met with in a much infe- 
rior writer, and one who was himself superstitious 
enough in his way, I mean Cyril of Jerusalem, who, 
TTipt a-a)fjictTog, kccps clcar of cxtravagaucc on a subject 
where very few of his contemporaries could observe the 
bounds of moderation. It must also be admitted that 
the great man to whose praises Gregory devotes the 
above cited oration, although the principal mover and 
patron of the ascetic life, yet abstains from many of the 
reprehensible sentiments which abound in the writings 
of the Nicene age. Basil, far surpassing his brother 
Nyssen, and his friend Nazianzen, in substantial quali- 
ties, as well of the intellect as of the heart, may pro- 
perly be adduced as affording the most impressive ex- 
ample that can be imagined of the fatal tendency of the 
theology of the age, in perverting minds even of the 
highest order. Of Basil's superiority to most of his 
contemporaries — the superiority of sound sense, and 
right Christian feeling, we might well enough adduce, 
as instances, those frequent passages in which his papis- 
tical editors feel it necessary to attach a caute legendum 
to a paragraph-— that is to say, to places where the wri- 
ter is seen to be rising above the superstitions of his 

'^1 



238 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

limes. Such an instance we find in the Homily on the^ 
Incarnation, where Basil, touching the topic that had 
been so poorly handled by Nyssen, and that was to be 
so abused by Augustine, treats, as of little practical im- 
portance, the very point which they, and others, laboured 
to establish as of ineffable moment and solemnity. Ne- 
vertheless, and amidst the frequent outbursts of a better 
reason and of a better faith, this great and devout man 
yields himself, like others, to that same gnostic notion 
of the divine character, of which the ascetic doctrine, 
and, particularly, the institute of celibacy, were the pro- 
per expressions. On what warrant of scripture does 
Basil dare to affirm that virginity is, '' that which makes 
man resemble the incorruptible God?" Neither our 
Lord, nor the apostles, utter a word that gives even a 
colour to an anthropomorphous sentiment of this kind.. 
The doctrme is, in fact, puve gnosticism : and the ine- 
vitable practical effect of it, is to impel the Christian to 
pursue an ideal, or Platonic, instead of a genuine and 
spiritual species of sanctity. I can suppose nothing less 
than that, while Basil and his contemporaries were treat- 
ing subjects of this class, the being they were thinking 
of was not the true God of the scriptures, but the incor- 
poreal First Mind, of the eastern tlieosophy. 

Let us then listen a moment to the bisliop of Caesa- 
rea, and say, impartially, whether his style resembles 
most that of Paul, Peter, John; or that of Saturninus,. 
Basilides, Valentinian, It is not a few sentences, taken 
apart, that can convey a just impression of the writer's 
niind and feeling. I indulge the hope therefore that di-^ 
ligent and conscientious students will read for themselves 
the entire tract I am now referring to, De Vera Virgini- 
tate, (torn, i.) and satisfy themselves on the question^, 
which has become a very important one, Whether th»- 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 239 

Nicene church was, or was not, fatally affected by the 
oriental poison: I would even stake the present argu- 
ment upon an examination of this very tract. 

"A great (virtue) truly is virginity, which, to say all 
in a word, renders man like to the incorruptible God. 
And this (virginity) is not a something that goes forth 
from (springs from) the corporeal, until it reaches the 
«oul, but belonging to the incorporeal soul, (the gnostic 
principle expressly) as a choice excellence, avails, by its 
own incorruptness, for preserving uncorrupt that which 
is corporeal. For the soul having conceived, and hold- 
ing to the idea of the true good, is wafted aloft in its ap- 
proaches toward it, as on the wing of this incorruptness 
(virginity,) and, as like to like, intently waiting upon the 
incorruptible God, brings up the virginity of the body as a 
ready and obsequious servant to assist it ever in the calm 
contemplation of the divine perfections; and for this pur- 
pose, and that it may admit, as in a pure mirror, the divine 
image, it dispels all those perturbing passions which af- 
fect our lower nature." Farther on, in the same treatise, 
De Vera Virginitate, the nun is said to strive to present 
herself to the incorporeal deity ^i/^v«r, and unconscious 
of any pleasures atlacliingto the body? I can do nothing 
more, consistently, with the limits within which this 
branch of the argument must be restricted, than just 
point to the places where sentiments of this sort are to 
be met with in their expanded form. In the view of the 
general reader, who must accept this sort of evidence, 
as it is laid before him, my inferences may seem to be 
too slenderly connected with the facts, as adduced. Let 
them then be contradicted by those who have at com- 
mand the means of examining this evidence in the mass. 
Or, let the advocates of ancient Christianity favour the 
world by including among the ^' records of the church," 



240 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

a translation, wfiole and entire^ of this very treatise on 
the true virginity. 

It is of a piece with the false and gnostic notion of the 
mode of approaching the Deity, as advanced by Basil, 
that this wise and holy man is found spending his 
strength upon the observances of factitious sanctity; and 
that, in a practical composition addressed directly to wo- 
men, he enters, WMth the most offensive particularity, 
into physical disquisitions and speculations of a kind 
not only totally unbecoming in a minister of religion, 
and marvellously improper as intended for a lady's ora- 
tory, but unconnected, in the remotest w^ay, with the 
culture of that '^' true holiness" of which the apostles 
speak. But the two systems of virtue were wrought 
out of altogether different elements. Basil, like Nazi- 
anzen and others, thinks himself called upon to enter a 
Christian lady's dressing-room, and there to give her re- 
ligious rules for the whole of her behaviour at the toi- 
let, gravely enjoining her, among sundry instructions 
equally important, in pity to the angels who visit her 
chamber, to use the utmost despatch in the necessary 
care of her hair, lest they, to their own peril, should 
look too long upon her dishevelled tresses! Then fol- 
lows the customary reference to Gen. vi. 2, our author 
having before warned the nun of preserving her bash- 
fulness, not merely when in the presence of men, but 
always, and in recollection of the " circumambient an- 
gels," from whose regards she could never withdraw 
herself. — (Tom. i. p. 747, of the Paris edition, 1618.) 

Now if we assume that these miserable and perni- 
cious refinements actually took effect, as they were likely 
to do, on the minds of sensitive and superstitious young 
women, could the result be any tiling else than that of 
diverting the thoughts from whatever is truly spiritual 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 241 

^nd genuine in piety, and putting in its place, a morbid 
solicitude concerning the person, so imaginative in its 
objects, and so voluptuous in its style, as to differ very 
little from the most dangerous species of prurience? A 
nunnery, fully brought under this sort of management^ 
could become nothing better than a spiritual harem. 
Shall we then wish for our daughters, that, in place of 
the rational and truly apostolic instructions which they 
are receiving from modern Christian pastors, they should 
be consigned to the influence of divines, such as Basil, 
Nazianzen, Nyssen! Horrid thought! nevertheless from 
this utterly vicious syste*m nothing could even now save 
us, if once we were to resolve to surrender ourselves 
to what we are taught to reverence as catholic teaching. 
*' Catholic teaching!" Basil's treatise on virginity is ca- 
tholic teaching, and a perfecily fair specimen of the lan- 
guage -and temper of the times. If any thing at all be 
catholic, that is to say, ancient and universal, the false 
gnostic theosophy of the ascetic institute is catholic. 

A few phrases, as I have said, can convey but a very 
imperfect impression of the spirit and tendency of a pro- 
lix treatise, and yet more copious quotations must em- 
brace what it would be an outrage to every right feeling 
to adduce. An unreserved translation of Basil — one of 
the best of the fathers, cuuld it be tolerated, would as- 
tound the Christian world. 1 have affirmed that a reli- 
gious house of the times now in question, could be little 
better than a harem; if this imputation be resented, as it 
probably may, let the facts implied by Basil toward the 
close of the treatise I have cited, be taken as evidence 
that a modern Turkish seraglio, might be chosen as a 
preferable asylum for female virtue. Or if this evidence 
were not enough, I shall presently have to refer to pas- 
sages in Chrysostom and in Jerome, the plain import of 

21* 



242 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

which, making every reasonable allowance, will leave 
a decisive advantage to be claimed for a pacha's palace, 
if compared with the ^.ncieni koiv 0/2 lov. 

To repress and exclude the abuses invariably attend- 
ant upon this vicious system, the great writers of the 
time laboured with indignant animation. But not even 
one of them, as it appears, set himself to call in question 
the principle upon which it rested, or inquired in what 
school that principle had been learned. So thoroughly 
had the feeling and the notions of w^hat I cannot scruple 
to call a baptized soofTeeism, pervaded the Christian com- 
munity, that no suspicion seems to have been entertained 
of the cheat which so early had put the Buddhist theo- 
sophy in the room of Christian theology — leaving to 
the church its dry orthodoxy indeed, but hiding from it 
the genuine conception of the divine nature. 

In an argument such as the one now before us, it may 
be well to abstain from citing those writers whose repu- 
tation was in any way tarnished, or whose style is not 
in harmony with that of the age they lived in; or if re- 
ferences of this kind are made, it should be only so far 
as these less esteemed authorities speak the language 
that w^as authenticated by their better reputed contempo- 
raries, and which does but echo prevailing opinions. 
Now with these cautions in view, and after the most 
esteemed fathers, such as Basil, and the two Gregories, 
have been consulted on the subject of the angelic per- 
fection of the ascetic life, let the Ilymns of Synesius be 
referred to. In these beautiful compositions (some of 
them) the oriental theosophy, under whatever temporary 
designation it may pass, and w^hether it be called Bud- 
dhism, or soofTeeism, or Pythagorism, or Platonism, or 
gnosticism — this same doctrine, thinly spangled with 
Christian phrases, is clearly and boldly expressed. 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 243 

These hymns then, as the productions of a man, albeit 
a bishop, and an associate of the great divines of the age, 
who at the time of his almost compulsory consecration,- 
did not profess himself to be much better than half a 
Christian, could not fairly avail us, in argument, as le- 
gitimate evidence, if they did not find parallels in the 
best theological writings of the time. If indeed a cor- 
rect notion of gnosticism is to be gathered from the re- 
ports of Clement, Irenaeus, and Origen, this airy and 
seductive doctrine, utterly unlike Christian theology, is 
substantially imbodied in the Hymns of Synesius, leaving 
out indeed so much of its jargon, as must have shocked 
every Christian ear, and expressing just so much as 
might find its apology in the v/ritings of the orthodox. 
This gnostic doctrine then, as advanced by the bishop 
of Cyrene, implies the total oblivion as well of man's 
real condition, as guilty and morally corrupt, and of the 
divine purity, opposed to this corruption, and the put- 
ting in the place of these truths, the Buddhist idea of the 
Father of souls, or ocean of mind, into which pure spi- 
rits, struggling away from matter, are at length to return. 
If the first and second hymn be compared with Basil's 
treatise on virginity, from which I have already made 
an extract, not merely a loose resemblance, but a close 
analogy must be acknowledged to connect the two wri- 
ters, in this instance; and if the bishop of Cyrene em- 
ploys a phrase or two which the bishop of Ceesarea 
would perhaps have rejected, there is little or nothing to 
choose between the two, either as to principle, or ten- 
dency. 

Many turns of expression, occurring in the hymns of 
Synesius, might pass unnoticed by a modern reader 
who was not already apprized of the specific sense at- 
tached to such phrases in the contemporary gnostic 



B44 CONNEXION OF THE ANCIENT CELIBATE 

schools. Some indeed of these modes of speaking would 
seem strange in tlie last degree, and utterly unwarrant- 
able : as for instance, when, addressing the Deity the 
poet says — 

Sy TTitTy^, (TV cf' i(r(Ti ^cti-^p 

but when we come to open the records of gnosticism, 
the real value, or, as it is called, the historic sense of 
these characteristic phrases presents itself clearly enough. 
Such are the terms — "root of the world," "root of 
roots," "fountain of fountains;" and the prosopopeias 
of "Wisdom," "Mind," "Generative Power," "Ce- 
lestial Silence," and the like. " The wave-troubled 
Hyle," the " bright Morpha," the "Primogenitive Beau- 
ty," and the "daemon swarm which Nature hatches." 
And such too is the language in which Synesius lauds 
the abstractive life, which, as he says, "opens to the 
human spirit a way of return to the upper sphere" (lan- 
guage almost identical with that of Basil; see particularly 
the close of the second hymn; or of the third) and he prays 
that, until he shall be permitted to lose himself &gain in 
the "ocean of light," and while compelled to submit to 
the trammels of the corporeal state, he may at least be 
aided in leading a life as exempt as possible from human 
alTections, and from all contact with the soul-depressing 
Hyle. With these aspirations of the lofty mystic, it is 
rather curious to compare the temper and conduct of the 
real Synesius — the palpable bishop of Cyrene, who does 
not dissemble the fact that he would fain have relieved 
the tedium of his corporeal existence, now and then, by 
the jocund pleasures of the chase. 

If an elaborate disquisition on this important feature 
of ancient Christianity were in hand (instead of a hasty 



WITH THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 245 

allusion to it, which is all I can attempt) the hymns of 
Synesius might very properly be taken as the text of the 
argument; with these, adduced at length, should then 
be compared the entire extant specimens of the language 
of the professedly gnostic teachers— Syrian and Egyp- 
tian. Next should follow, what might easily be collect- 
ed, a copious collection of passages from the Nicene 
writers, presenting, not merely innumerable coincidences 
of expression, but many real analogies, of doctrine, and 
near approximations in feeling; and all tending, in the 
same direction, to establish, beyond a doubt, the fact, 
that the oriental theosophy, while formally repelled by 
the orthodox church, had silently worked its way into 
all minds; uttering itself in the various modes of mystic 
exaggeration, and condensing its practical import within 
the usages of the ascetic system. The massive walls of 
the church, like a hastily constructed coifer-dam, had re- 
pelled, from age to age, the angry billows of the gnostic 
heresy, which could never open a free passage for them- 
selves within the sacred enclosure. Nevertheless these 
waters, bitter and turbid, no sooner rose high around the 
shattered structure, than, through a thousand fissures, 
they penetrated, and in fact stood at one and the same 
mean level, within, where they were silently stagnant, 
as without, where they were in angry commotion. 
Dare we say that, at rest, they worked themselves either 
clear or sweet? 

II. Connexion of the Celibate with the Notions 

ENTERTAINED OF THE ScHEME OF SALVATION. 

We have in the next place to inquire in what way 
and to what extent, the principle and practice of re- 



246 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

ligious celibacy affected, as well the doctrine as the sen- 
timent of the ancient church, in regard to the scheme of 
salvation, and the means of the divine mercy toward 
man, as depraved, and as liable to condemnation. 

There is surely some prominent truth which broadly 
distinguishes Christianity, as compared with every other 
religious system, and which may be taken as its leading 
characteristic; nor can we hesitate to name, as such, the 
mode it propounds for restoring mankind, guilty and pol- 
luted, to the divine favour — a scheme utterly unlike 
any which man has devised for himself. Every thing 
else, belonging to the gospel, may find, elsewhere, its 
faint resemblance, or its imperfect rudiment: but this 
doctrine is the prerogative of the inspired writings; ob- 
scurely, yet substantially unfolded in the Old, fully and 
brightly set forth in the New Testament. By empliasis, 
this doctrine of mercy, however variously expressed, or 
peculiarly expounded in different schools of divinity, is 
called — the Gospel; for it is the happy news which God 
only could announce; which man never had surmised, 
and which, although so worthy as it is of all accepta- 
tion, he has perversely shown himself, in every age, 
marvellously slow to apprehend, apt to lose sight of, and 
prompt to embarrass or deny. 

In the present instance, as I am anxious to avoid, on the 
one hand, the style and method of a philosophical or 
generalized disquisition, so on the other, I would gladly 
refrain from the specific, or technical language of a theo- 
logical or polemical treatise; keeping close to what is 
proper to a plain historical inquiry concerning facts 
which may be unquestionably established by an appeal 
to evidence. But, avoiding every phrase that has ac- 
quired a controversial sense, and every mode of expres- 
sion that may recall the *' confession" of this, that, or 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 247 

the other religious party, one may snrely speak of the 
characteristic principle of Christianity, in terms such as, 
without being vague, shall carry the concurrence of all 
devout and intelligent readers of the scriptures. Is not, 
then, the gospel a message of mercy — free, full in its 
provisions, and sovereign — a message implying that all 
men are, in this regard, on a level in the sight of God, 
and that that which is indispensable to the salvation of 
the most flagitious offenders, is not the less indispensable 
to that of the most amiable and harmless? Is not the 
gospel ONE METHOD OF SALVATION, Sufficient and effica- 
cious for the worst — necessary for the best? Does not 
the gospel (if indeed it be understood,) carry with it as 
thorough a lesson of humiliation to one proud heart, as 
to another? Does it not bring with it as much, and as 
sure a consolation to one guilty heart, as to another? 
Does it not convince all men alike, of sin, and of moral 
impotency? Does it not confirm all (if indeed it be ac- 
cepted,) in the same good hope of acceptance, and of 
being regarded as now no longer aliens, but as sons, and 
as fellow-heirs with Christ? 

In whatever way other religious schemes, that have 
prevailed in tlie world, may be classified, they all stand 
at an equal distance from Christianity, in regard to its 
peculiarity and its glory, its doctrino of justification, 
through faith: some of these schemes may, indeed, ap- 
proach it more nearly than others, as to its morality: 
some seem to come within the penumbra of the light 
which it sheds upon the unseen world; some consist 
better than others with the temporal well-being of man;^ — 
but all occupy a ground immeasurably remote from that on 
which the gosj)el takes its stand. All differ from Chris- 
tianity, in this respect, just as night differs from day; and 
whether the night be rendered magnificent by millions 
of stars, or be overcast with the thickest clouds. 



248 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

If at any time a comparison be instituted between 
true religion and false religion, taken absolutely, it may 
barely be worth the labour it may co&t, to distinguish 
among the several kinds of the latter; inasmuch as all 
come nearly to the same practical result; the best, as 
well as the worst, leaving man uncomforted in the pro- 
spect of futurity, and unamended, in his heart and life. 

But when, as now, our intention is to make inquiry 
concerning the particular corruptions which true religion 
has undergone, in the lapse of ages, it then becomes ne- 
cessary to distinguish, and to classify a little, those se- 
veral forms of error which have successively overlaid 
the truth, one by one; or several in conjunction. Such 
a discrimination is absolutely requisite, (as all protestants 
admit) in relation to Romanism, which so strangely and 
so admirably combines the main principles of every an- 
terior false religion. Nor shall we find it, really, less 
requisite in following up to their sources, those fatal errors 
of the ancient church, which gradually ripened into Ro- 
manism. 

All religions have been of Asiatic origin; and (the true 
now not considered) they resolve themselves easily into 
two great principles, conveniently designated by the 
historical terms Buddhism, and Brahminism. The in- 
fluence of the former, in its more recent garb, as gnosti- 
cism, we have already adverted to; and especially in so far 
as it gave birth to, and sustained, the abstractive ascetic 
practice, and the doctrine of the angelic virtue of virgi- 
nity. We shall next have to trace the operation, latent 
indeed, but unquestionable, of the Brahminicai principle, 
combining itself with the former; and the two, hostile 
as they were east of the Indus, blending together, most 
amicably, within the precincts of the Christian church. 
This blended Buddhism and Braiiminism is, in a word, 



SCHEME OE SALVATION. 249 

the ancient monkery, at once abstractive and penitential. 
How shall wretched man return to virtue and happi- 
ness? The Buddhist, the Sooffee, the Pythagorean, the 
gnostic, replied — By extricating the imperishable spirit 
from its connexion with matter, the eternal source of 
evil; and by merging itself anew in the eternal, univer- 
sal good. The characteristic of this scheme, under all 
its varieties, is its total disregard of the moral derange- 
ment of human nature; or rather, we should say, its 
view of moral evil as a mere accident, and a temporary 
consequence of natural evil. In its practical instruc- 
tions, therefore, it insisted more upon mental abstraction, 
silence, simplicity of diet, and celibacy, than upon any 
positive austerities, or propitiatory rites: sin, man's mis- 
fortune, not fault, did not need to be expiated. 

But the Brahminical doctrine took up the other ele- 
ment of theology; and along with its terrible array of 
divinities, most of them vindictive, and all invested with 
human qualities, it propounded a system of propitiation, 
and concerned itself immediately with the moral senti- 
ment^ and wrought upon the conscience: it addressed it- 
self more to the fears, than to the hopes of which the 
human mind is alternately the sport: it admitted man to 
be guilty, and in danger of wrath; it was, therefore, san* 
guinary, gloomy, sumptuous, and elaborate in ceremo- 
nial, popular in its aspect, rather than philosophical, and 
of unbounded potency, involving as it did, and having 
at its command, all the terrors that wait upon guilt; so 
that it could enforce the most revolting, and the most 
excruciating practices of immolation,' and of self-torture. 
In the name of the gods, the avengers of crime, it could 
command the trembling wretch — its victim, to inflict 
upon himself, or to sustain, whatever pains he might 

imagine his angrv judge to be prepared to inlict upon 

22 



250 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

him. If we would see the two oriental systems, and 
each characteristically imbodied, (one might say disim- 
bodied^ for each leaves to man barely a shadow of his 
entire constitution) we should only have to look, on the 
one hand, to the dreaming sooffee, lost to sense and na- 
tural affection, an idiot sage, or, as one might say, a 
metaphysic vegetable, just alive, where he sits; and on 
the other side, to the Hindoo fakir, crucified without a 
cross, his nails piercing his palms; the martyr of con^ 
science, and grasped by the despair of guilt. 

The church of Rome has, without scruple, adopted, 
intimately blended, and refined, these two schemes of 
religion; and after having formally and tacitly, dogma- 
tically and practically, excluded the gospel, it has pro- 
vided itself with a circuitous, and somewhat complex 
reply to the question which the alarmed conscience is 
ever and again propounding. Its answer to the ques- 
tion — " What must a man do to be saved?" involves 
something of Buddhism, and more of Brahminism; it 
takes up the gnostic physical abstraction, and the philo- 
sophic sanctity, and this it offers to its elite, the elevated,, 
impassioned, and devotional few: and then it takes up 
the moral element of religion, and deals in penances, 
macerations, ffagellations, masses, confessions, absolu- 
tions, purgatorial expiations, and the vicarious offices of 
the clergy, and of the saints, of the dead, and of the^ 
living; and this compound it offers to the rabble of man- 
kind — the debauched and trembling multitude, who, as 
the long dreaded time comes, when nothing better can be 
thouglit of, thankfully accept from the priests' handsy 
any salvation that is offered to them, and on any terms. 
In thinking of popery, we should never lose sight of 
its two blended elements — its Buddhism, and its Brah^^ 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 251 

minism — its abstractive, and its expiatory principles — 
its provision for the few, and its provision for the many. 
Both ingredients are brought to bear, as in a focus, upon 
the monastic institute, of which, celibacy, the prime 
article, stood chiefly related to the first of them ; while 
the practices of mortification and penance were related 
to the second. The perfect monk, * the angel upon 
earth,' such as we find him elaborately depicted by the 
great church writers from Basil to Bernard, was at once, 
and in nearly equal proportions, the soofiee, and the 
fakir ; the enthusiast, and the fanatic ; the sublime theo- 
sophist, and the bleeding, weeping, whining or puling 
martyr of a darkened conscience. 

But alas! it is not alone of the superstition of the 
middle ages that we have thus to speak ; for ancient 
Christianity — the universally accredited system of the 
Nicene age, blends, in the like manner, though with less 
compactness, the two ingredients of the natural religion 
of mankind ; and while it was most explicitly gnostic, 
in its temper and sentiments, was also Brahminicai, as 
well in doctrine as in practice. 

If, with the great divines of the fourth century around 
us, we plainly put the question to one, and all — '* How 
shall guilty man approach the just and holy God, and 
how secure his favour?" the prompt and formal answer, 
no doubt will be — " By humbly accepting the redemp- 
tion procured for mankind by the Saviour Christ, and 
conveyed through the hands of the church." But then 
this reply is ordinarily couched in very indefinite terms; 
and when we Come to repeat our demand; and to pursue 
it as a practical question, then the more exact answer 
given, by one and all, is to this efifect — " First, that 
man may place himself near to God, and may anticipate, 
on earth, the absolute virtue and felicity of heaven, by 



252 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

removing himself, as far as possible, from the inimical 
^>^» with which, in the present state, he is implicated; 
and with this view, that is to say, if he would be perfect, 
he must regard the preservation of an inviolate virginity 
as the great business of piety; and then, thus far ex- 
empted from the conditions of animal life, he must addict 
himself to lofty meditations of the divine attributes: or, 
to use the very words of Chrysoslom, *' That the soul 
disengaged from its trammels and all earthly thoughts, 
should wing its way to its home, and its native soil." 
But secondly, that, in order to regain and secure the 
favour of God, man must propitiate his offended judge, 
and take into his own hands, in the present life, that 
discipline of chastisement which he so well merits, and 
may so justly expect as his due. Now, in this latter 
point of view, celibacy has its use, as the necessary 
condition of that mode of life which leaves a man at full 
leisure to practise the whole round of expiatory and 
abstersive austerities. How should the married and the 
busy get through, from day to day, with the heavy work 
of penance? Such, in substance, was the ancient theo- 
logy, and the piety of the Nicene church! 

Within this system, therefore, religious celibacy was 
at once the expression of gnostic feelings (as we have 
seen) and the condition, or the preliminary of a course 
of penance and expiation. 

Yet let it not for a moment be supposed that the Nicene 
church, or that the great writers of that age, either for- 
mally denied, or failed frequently to mention, the great 
doctrine of the remission of sins, granted through the 
means of the sacrifice once offered on the cross. The 
ancient church no more denied this doctrine, than it re- 
jected orthodoxy; nevertheless tha relative position into 
which it had been suffered to subside, was such as in 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 253 

fact involved a loss of its vital influence: it no longer 
presented its radiating surface towards the consciences 
of men. 

The experience of eighteen centuries might surely 
now sutlice for convincing the church that, to secure the 
eflicacy of the gospel, something more is requisite than 
a formal acknowledgment of a set of dogmas; and that 
the relative position of great principles, as foremost, or 
as hindermost, is the very circumstance on which de- 
pends their taking any effect upon the human mind. All 
systems, professedly Christian, agree in representing 
holiness, or an inwrought conformity to the moral cha- 
racter of God, as the end and substance of piety; and the 
difference between system and system turns upon the 
answer that is given to the question *' How (as to the 
process) is this holiness to be effected?" The gospel, 
and this is its characteristic, makes the free and absolute 
remission of sins, and an immediate reconciliation to 
God, through the mediation of Christ, the spring-prin- 
ciple, or motive of morality. To him who would be 
near God, and to him who would be like God, it says — • 
*' Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of 
the world.'' This is the gospel method of holiness* 
Reconciled to God, and enjoying the privileges of chil- 
dren, the Spirit of holiness dwells in the hearts of be- 
lievers, as a purifying influence. 

But, if, instead of putting the doctrine of justification, 
and reconciliation, and of the free and absolute remission 
of sins, foremost, as the source and cause of genuine re- 
ligious feeling, and real virtue, we put an ill-digested^ 
half-philosophic, half-hindoo, notion of sanctity, fore- 
most, and if we bend our endeavours toward it, as the 
main object, then, whatever profession we may make of 
faith in Christ, our motives will have none of the vitali- 

22* 



254 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

ty, or of the force of Christian holiness. The sun is 
not indeed driven from the heavens, in such a system; 
but it is eclipsed; and the Christian, for such we must 
still call him, droops, becomes pallid, gloomy, supersti- 
tious, timid, punctilious; a trembling attendant upon 
rites, a perfunctory practitioner of ceremonies — fretting, 
fasting, upbraiding himself, impatient of earth, afraid to 
hope for heaven, and feeling like the dyspeptic patient 
who, in his troubled dreams, thinks himself to be labour- 
ing to mount a ladder, or to ascend a flight of steps ; and 
yet, with all his painful efforts, not rising an inch from 
the ground. Such is the sad condition of those in whose 
spiritual perspective the truths which should occupy the 
foreground, are seen in the distance;— they are indeed 
seen; but it is as " afar off," and as a cold glimmer. 

In the perspective of ancient Christianity, personal 
sanctity stood in front of the doctrine of justification by 
faith (or the doctrine, by whatever phrase it may be de- 
signated, which is the characteristic of the gospel) and 
so far obscured it: but this was not all; for, in front of 
this very doctrine of personal sanctity, stood the gnostic 
notion of angelic perfection, or virginity: thus was there 
effected a double eclipse of the light of the gospel. If 
the question had been put — *' What is a Christian's 
aim?" and it had been replied — " To be holy;" and 
again, ** How may he become holy in the most absolute 
manner?" the answer was — "By avoiding the contami- 
nations of matrimony, and by refraining, on earth, from 
that which the angels are denied in heaven — the marry- 
ing, and the being given in marriage." Of what avail 
then would it be to prove, by multiplied citations, that 
the doctrine of the remission of sins, and of justification, 
in some ambiguous sense of the term, was firmly held 
by the ancient church? Let reasonable men ask them- 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 255 

selves whether the gospel, such as we find it in the in- 
spired writings, could possibly consist with, or could be 
efficacious, as a body of motives, in combination with 
notions such as these? 

Is the doctrine of the atonement, and of a full remis- 
sion of sins, thereby procured, a doctrine of universal 
application, or is it not? Have all men equal need of 
it; or is it only a desperate resource, left for those who 
have unhappily failed to secure heaven for themselves 
in a more direct, honourable, and legitimate manner? 
This question is a vital one in relation to Christianity, 
and on the answer that may be given to it, whether our 
reply be formal or tacit, turns the entire character of our 
piety. Let then this question be repeated in any such 
pointed manner as may seem the most likely to bring it 
conclusively to an issue. All allow that the thief on the 
cross must have been saved by a sovereign extension, 
toward him, of that mercy, the means of which were, 
at that m.oment, being secured by the suffering Saviour. 
But if the "beloved disciple" had been dragged to Cal- 
vary, along with his Master, and if, as might have hap- 
pened, he had occupied the right-hand cross, would he 
too have been saved by the r-ame means as the thief, and 
on the very same principle? Or, had he already reached, 
by merit of virginity, and by the purity of his man- 
ners, such a proximity to the divine holiness, as that he 
needed nothing but just to drop the encumbrance of the 
flesh, and to find himself at ease before the eternal 
throne? We surely should not gather any such suppo- 
sition as this from his own language, when he says of 
the Saviour that '*He is the propitiation for our sins." 

But now there would be no end to our citations, were 
we to adduce all, or a third of those passages from the 
fathers in which the celibate, when held to in the strict- 



:^56 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

est manner, is spoken of as a mode of life differing from 
that of the angels in heaven, neither in purity, nor in 
security; and only so far in felicity, as resulted from the 
conditions of mortality: " drop the flesh, and then the 
monk, or the virgin nun, is at once a seraph!" That no 
such passage might be produced, I will not affirm, but 
certainly I have met with not so much as one, in which 
the inviolate virgin is spoken of as being, like others^ 
even like any repentant Magdalene, dependent altogether 
for salvation upon the vicarious merits of the Saviour. 
Allowing, however, that some such passage miglit be 
hunted up, yet assuredly it is not the usual style of the 
great church writers of the Nicene age. Certainly this 
way of putting the case, in relation to the monk and 
virgin, is not characteristic of *' catholic teaching." 
Catholic teaching runs in a contrary direction, and the 
clear import of it is to this practical effect — That, to 
have exhorted a *' spotless nun," in her last hour, to 
look to the atonement, as the only ground of hope for a 
dying sinner (or saint) would have been a very inappro- 
priate, unseemly, and even offensive sort of interference 
with the honour and comfort she was entitled to: and 
would have been an insult, like thrusting an obolus into 
the palm of a Crossus. 

I boldly ask any one competent to give me a reply, 
whether herein I misrepresent the general character of 
ancient catholic teaching; and if not, then I ask, appeal- 
ing, not merely to the few, who may be able to turn to 
the patristic folios, but to the right-minded Christian 
world at large, whether the first element of the gospel 
was not effectually and fatally compromised by an in- 
stitute which, in practice, superseded the ''only hope" 
that '' maketli not ashamed?" 

At this point we touch that article of discrimination — 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 257 

hat test which exhibits the difference between aposto- 
lic, and Nicene Christianity. Does Paul, when, either 
obliquely or directly, he expresses his personal hope of 
heaven, so speak as to imply that he looked to be ac- 
quitted, accepted, and saved, on any other principle than 
that which he would have urged upon a penitent prodi- 
gal, called, at an hour's warning, to appear before God? 
We confidently assume that the apostle who, if any 
ever have understood Christianity, understood it, was 
used to make no distinctions whatever between man and 
man, when persuading all to " lay hold of the hope set 
before them in the gospel." 

But how different is the style of the doctors of the 
Nicene and following age! Then, a spiritual aristocracy 
had grown up within the church; and those of this class 
who could profess that their celestial escutcheons were 
shamed by no spot — these, if never plainly told that 
they stood above the range of the gospel scheme of sal- 
vation, were seldom, if ever told, that they could claim 
no exemption, and were entitled to no prerogative, and 
must be saved, if at all, even as others. What then! 
after all her conflicts with nature, all her tears and fast- 
ings, must the spotless virgin, the spouse of Christ, 
submit, at the last, to the humiliation of standing along 
with the married, on the same level, needing mercy, 
even as others? alas! if it comes to this, has she not 
driven a poor trade? 

Those can know very little of the human heart who 
can believe that monks and nuns, talked to as they con- 
stantly were by their spiritual guides, and told that, be- 
cause virgins in body and soul, they stood as near 
to God as flesh and blood can stand — that these victims 
of delusion could, nevertheless, be humbly and contrite- 
ly relying, as sinners, upon the propitiatory work of 



258 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

Christ. It was not so in fact; no such spirit breathes 
through the extant records of monkish piety, here and 
there we gladly catch a faint gleam of sunshine, as in a 
wintry and watery day; but monkish piety, on the whole, 
was nothing better than what we must expect to meet 
with, as the proper fruit of this " catholic teaching." 

Catholic teaching! let us hear a little of it; and, for a 
sample, take the portrait of a spotless nun, as drawn by 
the master hand of Chrysostom himself: and be it re- 
membered, we are not now about to gaze upon the blind 
pharisee, whose lips, life, and manners, said to all around 
him — " Stand by, I am holier than thou;" but upon an 
ideal of Christian perfection, conceived and expressed by 
one who, irrespective of his high station in the church, 
has always been granted to stand forward as the prince 
of the fathers. 

The passage I am about to quote is taken from a tract 
to which I must again refer: it was composed by Chry- 
sostom, with the hope of repressing the infamous prac- 
tice against which, as we have seen, Cyprian, long be- 
fore, and in another quarter of the church, had vehe- 
mently protested, namely, that of nuns cohabiting with 
men, and which tract, with its companion, addressed to 
monks, contains admissions and exposures which one 
must have thought exaggerations, if they were not borne 
out by concurrent testimony. But let the archbishop's 
immaculate nun step upon the stage. Our author had 
just told the nun that, like cherubim and seraphim, she 
and her order, constituted, not the attendants of the 
eternal King, but his very chariot.^ 

* In quoting Chrysostom 1 shall refer to the volume and page 
of the recent Paris reprint of the Benedictine edition, which is 
perhaps as likely as any other to be accessible to the studious 
reader. The above occurs, torn. i. p. 321. 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 259^ 

" The virgin, when she goes abroad, should present 
herself as the bright specimen ctyct-KfAcn of all philosophy^ 
and strike all with amazement, as if now an angel had de- 
scended from heaven; or just as if one of the cherubim had 
appeared upon earth, and were turning the eyes of all 
men upon himself. So should all those who look upon 
the virgin be thrown into admiration, and stupor, at the 
sight of her sanctity. And when she advances, she 
moves as through a desert; or when she sits at church, 
it is with the profoundest silence, her eye catches no- 
thing of the objects around her; she sees neither wo- 
men nor men; but her Spouse only; and he, as if pre- 
sent and apparent; and then retiring to her home, there 
again she communes with him, in prayers, and his voice 
alone she listens to, in the scriptures; and of him there 
she thinks, whom she desires and loves; and whatever 
she does, it is as a pilgrim and a stranger, to whom 
things present are as nothing. Not only does she hide 
herself from the eyes of men, but avoids the society of 
secular women also. The body she takes care of only 
so far as necessity compels her, while she bestows all 
her regards upon the soul: and who shall not marvel at 
her? who shall not be in ecstasy, in thus beholding the 
angelic life, imbodied in a female form? And who is it 
that shall dare approach her? Where is the man who 
shall venture to touch this flaming spirit? Nay rather, 
all stand aloof, willing or unwilling; all are fixed in 
amazement, as if there were before their eyes a mass of 
incandescent and sparkling gold! Gold hath indeed by 
nature its splendour; but when saturate with fire, how 
admirable, nay even fearful is it! And thus, when a soul 
such as this occupies the body, not only shall the spec- 
tacle be wondered at by men, but even by angels." 
Miserable teaching this, whether catholic or not. How 



260 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

could the subject of any such rhapsody, if any might 
actually have thought herself the archetype of the pic- 
ture, how could she imagine herself obliged to listen, 
like others, to the humbling doctrine of the cross? But 
such as was the teaching and the system, such were its 
practical effects; and it is remarkable that, for an inge- 
nuous statement of these effects, we need go no farther 
than to the two tracts above named; for actually within 
the distance of a page or two from the place where this 
** lump of molten gold" dazzles the eye, we find de- 
scriptions "barely fit to be translated, of the ordinary 
night-scenes in a Constantinopolitan convent, or, more 
properly, ecclesiastical ^ittrrpo^/cv. Could nothing lead 
so wise and good a man as Chrysostom to entertain the 
suspicion that the church had, in this instance at least, 
utterly misunderstood the purport and spirit of the gos- 
pel? 

Under another head of this present argument, I shall 
feel it unavoidable to revert to the two connected tracts, 
from one of which the above-cited passage is taken : 
leaving, therefore, its context untouched at present — per- 
tinent though it be, I will here only observe that the quo- 
tation is a sample, one among hundreds, nay thousands, 
which might be easily produced, of a fault generally 
characteristic of the great writers (and the small writers) 
of the ancient church — I mean the propensity to magni- 
fy and glorify what is merely human; in fact, to worship 
and to deify the creature, more than the Creator; that is 
to say, so to magnify human virtue, as that, upon the 
general field of the people's view, the encomium of man 
subtends a larger angle, than the praises of God, and 
of his Christ. Do not the fathers then worship God? 
do they not adore the Son of God? Assuredly: but 
when they muster all the forces of their eloquence, when 



SCHEME OF SALVATIOK. 261 

they catch fire, and swell, as if inspired, whenever (I must 
be permitted to make the allusion, for it is really appro- 
priate,) whenever they take their seat upon the tripod 
and begin to foam, the subject of the rhapsody is sure to 
be — ** a blessed martyr," it may be an apostle; or a re- 
cently departed " doctor," or, " a virgin confessor;" or 
it is the relics of such a one, and the miraculous virtues 
of his sacred dust. If, in turning over these folios, the 
eye is any where caught by the frequency of interjec- 
tions, such a page is quite as likely to be found to spar- 
kle and flash with the commendations of the mother of 
God, or of her companion saints, as with the praises of 
the Son; and more often does the flood-tide of eloquence 
swell with the mysterious virtues of the sacraments, 
than with the power and grace of the Saviour. The 
Saviour does indeed sit enthroned within the veil of the 
Christian temple; but what the Christian populace hear 
most about, is — the temple itself, and its embroideries, 
and its gildings, and its ministers, and its rites, and the 
saints that All its niches. In a word, what was visible, 
and what was human, stood in front of what is invisible 
and divine; and when we find a system of blasphemous 
idolatry fully expanded in the middle ages, this system 
<;annot, in any equity, be spoken of as any thing else 
than a following out of the adulatory rhapsodies of the 
great writers and preachers of the Nicene church. 

Of this impious adulation the martyrs and confessors 
were the first objects; and then came those "terrestrial 
seraphs," the monks and virgins. The ancient church, 
well knowing its real and vast superiority, on all grounds 
of theological truth, and moral principle, as compared 
with the polytheistic world, or with the schools of phi- 
losophy, and yet trampled to the dust, and contemned, 

23 



262 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

and exposed to humiliations, such as human nature very 
seldom well sustains, sought to right itself, as far as it 
could, by indulging in exaggerations of every kind; and 
no sooner did it get the upper hand of its enemies, that 
is to say — its abstract Enemy, and its personal persecu- 
tors in every particular vicinity, than it gave vent to its 
stifled pride and resentment, in torrents of adulatory 
congratulation, in the hurry of which the glory of God 
stood in abeyance, while the vindicatory praises of man 
were to be uttered. 

In advancing this general allegation, I must decline to 
appeal, for support, to those who, by a long and fond 
converse with Christian antiquity, and by mere familia- 
rity with its style, have ceased to feel what others would 
most painfully be conscious of; but I am willing to be 
judged by any well-informed persons, of sound and unda- 
maged mind, who^ fraught with genuine Christian senti- 
ments, and hitherto unacquainted with the writers in 
question, shall look through the orations of the most 
noted of them, such, I mean, as Chrysostom, Basil, the 
two Gregories, Jerome, and Augustine. On what oc- 
casions then do these great orators and doctors kindle 
and glow? When is it that they exhaust the powers 
of language, and return upon their theme, as if they 
could never think that they had done it justice? Is it when 
they are holding forth, before the multitude, the glory 
of the Saviour of sinners? Is it when they are blowing 
the silver trumpet of mercy, in the hearing of the guilty? 
Alas! it is not so. The Saviour, not denied indeed, but 
not glorified, is left, by these orators, to sleep in the 
hinder part of the ship: or he is imprisoned in the creeds 
and liturgies of the church, while commendations, which 
Grecian and Roman sages would equally have loathed 
to have pronounced, and have blushed to have receivedr 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 263 

are lavished upon the heroes of the church and its an* 
chorets. 

Are these representations fair or not? I appeal to 
those who will go with fresh and modern Christian feeU 
ings, into the company of the fathers. But if the facts 
be such as I allege, will any pretend that an unaffected 
and heart-stirring proclamation of the gospel — the glad 
tidings of mercy, free, and adapted to all men's accep- 
tation, was likely to consist with so much bombast and 
frippery, about the merits, miracles, and virtues of the 
shoals of saints that burden the calendar? Two such 
abhorrent elements will never coalesce; and if the church 
must and will have her demi-gods, to adorn her state in 
the eyes of the prostrate multitude, she must even fore- 
go the presence of her Lord. 

A dry, polemic orthodoxy, severed from the gospel, 
is the doctrinal description of ancient Christianity: and 
I here refuse to be put to silence by any who shall re- 
turn the phrase " the gospel," upon me, as if I used it 
in the cant sense of this, or that, modern sect; and as if 
it conveyed some restricted and special scheme of doc- 
trine. By the gospel, I mean nothing more or less than 
the frank declaration of God's mercy to guilty man, aS' 
suring to him, through faith in Christ, the full and ab- 
solute remission of his sins, and an exemption from "all 
condemnation," and fear of wrath. I do not affect to 
speak as a theologian; nor care to cut and trim the 
phrases I may employ, so as shall make them square 
with this or that ''confession." Does the Bible offer 
no broad and universally intelligible sense, even on the 
most momentous subjects? If it do, then it does so 
in conveying, to the troubled conscience, a message of 
joy — authentic, simple, efficacious, and such as subdues 
^he grateful heart to obedience. 



264 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

— Now, meaning this by — the gospel, I affirna that, 
from beginning to end of the patristic remains, the clear- 
ness and brightness of the message of mercy is obscured, 
its simplicity encumbered, and its efficacious power al- 
most entirely nullified. In entering the awful and gor- 
geous edifice of the ancient church, one's feelings are 
very much such as might belong to a descent into some 
stalactite cavern, the grim magnificence of which is never 
cheered by the life-giving beams of heaven; for there is 
no noon there — no summer. The wonders of the place 
must be seen by the glare of artificial light; human hands 
carry hither and thither a blaze, which confounds ob- 
jects, as much as reveals them, and which fills the place 
more with fumes than with any genial influence. In 
this dim theatre forms stand out of more than mortal 
mien, as if a senate of divinities had here assembled; 
but approach them — all is hard, cold, silent. Drops are 
thickly distilling from the vault; nay, every stony icicle 
that glistens in the light, seems as if endued with peni- 
tence, or as if contrition were the very temper of the 
place: but do these drops fertilize the ground on which 
they fall? No, they do but trickle a moment, and then 
add stone to stone — chill to chill. Does the involuntary 
exclamation break from the bosom in such a place — 
Surely this is the very gate of heaven! Rather one shud- 
ders with the apprehension that one is entering the sha- 
dows of the valley of death; and that the only safety is 
in a quick return to the upper world. 

Negations and deficiencies are not easily to be set 
forth, in any of the usual modes of adducing evidence; 
nor is it to be supposed that the general allegation of a 
want of that element which makes the gospel, a gospel, 
as attaching to ancient Christianity, could be established 
by the citation of a few passages collected here and 



SCHEME OF SALVATION, 265 

t'nere. The fact alleged, presents itself to a rightly prin- 
cipled mind, in passing up and down through the patris- 
tic theology. What we ought to meet with in Christian 
writers, we do not find; or find it seldom, and find it 
overlaid, and find it wrought up with neutralizing ingre- 
dients. I will, however, endeavour to put a clue into the 
hand of the diligent student, which may enable him, 
with less labour than otherwise, to verify or to correct 
the averment here made, namely, That the religious ce- 
libacy of the ancient church, springing as it did from a 
gnosticised theology, excluded, or did not in fact consist 
with, that clear, cordial, efficacious, announcement of 
God's free mercy to a guilty world, through the propi- 
tiating work of Christ, which is the characteristic of the 
inspired scriptures, and which it has pleased God to re- 
vive, more or less fully, in the m.odern church. It is this 
heart-stirring preaching of Christ (no imputation of em- 
ploying the phrase in a sectarian sense, shall deter 
me from the just use of it) it is this which makes 
Christianity a living doctrine; and it is this, of which 
we find but faint and feeble indications, look where we 
may, among the early writers. Between a dialectic and 
partisan orthodoxy on the one hand, and on the other, a 
mystification of the sacraments, and a stern, or fanatical 
asceticism, the gospel nearly disappears. Those who 
have known what it is, with a hand, warm with health, 
to take within their own the hand of a corpse, know how 
the chill ascends to the heart, and enters the soul. Of 
this sort is the feeling with which, if the mind be quick- 
ened by scriptural piety, it makes its first acquaintance 
with the body of ancient Christianity. 

A sample or two of each of those kinds of evidence 
of which the present subject is susceptible, I shall now 

adduce; such, for instance, as formal statements of be- 

23* 



266 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

lief — expositions of scripture — panegyrics of distin- 
guished individuals, and accidental expressions of reli- 
gious feeling. Of the first, we may take the following 
*' Short Summary of Christian Belief," conveying the 
faith of the accomplished Boethius, an orthodox, whe- 
ther or not a Christian writer. This compendium, 
** Brevis Fidei Christianas Complexio," after defining 
the Athanasian doctrine, as opposed to the several chief 
heresies of the times, goes on with an historical enume- 
ration of the leading facts of Christianity, up to the mo- 
ment of our Lord's ascension, and the commission given 
the apostles, to evangelize the world, and then adds, 
** and whereas the human race, by the demerit of its na- 
ture, derived to it from the fault of the first sinner, had 
become pierced with the darts of eternal punishment, 
nor was sufficient for its own cure, (or salvation) having 
lost it in its progenitor. He (Christ) granted to it certain 
REMEDIAL SACRAMENTS, to the end that it (the human 
race) might acknowledge the diflerence between what it 
merited by nature, and what it received by gift of grace; 
and that, as nature could bring punishment only, grace, 
not called grace if granted to merit, might furnish what- 
ever appertains to salvation." 

Such is the sum of the gospel, according to Boethius, 
who adds not a word more concerning the scheme of 
mercy. It may be said that he affirms salvation to be 
by grace, not merit, but what are the channels or the 
expressions of this grace of heaven? Nothing else than 
the remedial sacraments, in duly accepting which, from 
the hand of the priest, guilty men receive all that they 
have any need to think of; just as if the sacraments 
were potent drugs, or chemical antidotes, infallibly dis- 
persing the poison inherited from Adam! But was that 
which animated the labours of the apostles, in traversing 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 267 

kingdoms, and in crossing seas to proclaim the unsearch- 
able riches of Christ, was it, in fact — to impart the sa- 
craments, and to open, in every country, genuine dis- 
pensaries of these panaceas for guilt and wo? There 
may be those who will not hesitate to reply in the affir- 
mative, and who, with the Pauline epistles before them, 
will nevertheless profess their belief that, to give men 
every where a ready access to the two sacraments, was 
the object and completion of Paul's unwearied labours. 
There are those who will say this. Thank Cod there 
are multitudes who have read their Bibles to better pur- 
pose, and who, while happily ignorant of ancient, under- 
stand something of apostolic, Christianity. 

When a question is in progress concerning the alleged 
absence of some important element of truth, there is a 
convenience, at least, in referring to small, and yet com- 
prehensive tracts, which may soon be sifted. Now, 
with this view, we might take up again the often-quoted 
commonitorium of Vincent of Lerins. The writer's in- 
tention, and a com.mendable one, plainly was, to afford 
to a Christian man the ready and certain means of an- 
swering, for himself, the momentous question — " Am I 
right in matters of faith?" — '* am I on the road that leads 
to heaven?" And with this view he offers rules, well 
condensed, and carefully guarded, by application of 
which, in every particular instance of doubt, a Christian 
may discriminate between catholic truth, and heretical 
pravity, or, which is the same thing, novelty. But now 
the whole of this criterion of doctrine turns upon the 
perfection of trinitarianism; not a hint is dropped, any 
where, that there are other principles essential to Chris- 
tianity, after the Nicene faith has been duly secured. A 
reader of this tract is left to suppose that, if he do but 
hold the doctrine of the trinity, *♦ uncorriipt and entire," 



268 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

nothing farther is wanting to him: — he is then a Chris- 
tian — he is within the pale of the church, and as safe as 
all are on board a ship which is destined to reach her 
port. An orthodoxy purely logical, and which turns 
upon nicely trimmed phrases, came in the place of the 
entire Christianity of the apostolic writings. Vincent's 
catholicity has no more warmtli, no more vitality, in it 
than Aristotle's Ethics; nay, is really much less likely 
to generate sentiments of virtue. There is not in this 
treatise a paragraph, or a sentence animated by a refer- 
c^nce to the rich mercy of God in the gospel. We find 
the honours of the Mother of God — the Theotocos, care- 
fully affirmed; but very little is said of the glory of 
Christ as the Saviour of the world. Be it observed 
then, that, while a dry and verbal trinitarianism would 
well enough hold its place by the side of a gnosticised 
and ascetic ethical system, the life-giving gospel, speak- 
ing peace to the troubled conscience, and supplying the 
motives of true holiness, in the doctrine of justification 
by faith, this doctrine, which sets Christianity in utter 
contrariety to every other scheme of religion, has never 
consisted, can never consist with, any modification of 
the ascetic system: and in fact, the evangelical glory 
faded from the view of the ancient church at the moment 
when the oriental philosophy lodged itself within its 
bosom: from that time forw^ard the condition of the 
church w^as such as might very aptly be described in the 
language which Vincent himself applies to certain half 
heretics — ''half dead, half alive, who have swallowed 
just such a quantity of poison as neitlier kills them, nor 
may be digested, nor compels them to die, nor sufi^ers 
them to live." 

It must by no means be imagined that the early decay 
and the disappearance, at length, of the evangelic energy 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 269 

from the church, is attributable solely, or primarily, to 
the ascetic doctrine, and to the celibacy which it en* 
joined. To preclude any such supposition, which, in 
being dispelled, might seem to weaken my argument, I 
must, in passing, advert to the easily established fact, 
that this decay had commenced before the time when 
the ascetic practice had very perceptibly wrought its 
own effect upon the opinions and sentiments of the 
Christian body. By itself indeed it was enough (when 
fully expanded) to exclude the vital element of Christi- 
anity; but this element had already been edged off, by 
little and little, from the theological system, under the 
operation of several other causes; one of the chief of 
which, plainly, was the circumstance that Christianity, 
as early, at the latest, as the middle of the second cen* 
tury, had fallen into the hands, and thenceforv^^ard re- 
mained under the guardianship, of astute dialecticians, 
and wordy sophists, thoroughly trained in the intellec- 
tual gymnastics of the Grecian schools of philosophy, 
and who, while they found in the trinitarian doctrine a 
field well enough adapted to the performance of the evo- 
lutions in which they excelled, turned, with an instinc- 
tive distaste, from the Gospel, the ideas and sentiments 
connected with which were altogether unmanageable, as 
the materials, either of logical, or of metaphysical exer- 
cise. 

A pertinent exemplification of this order of things, in 
the course of which whatever, in the Christian scheme, 
was the most nearly allied to the favourite subjects of 
pneumatology, in its various branches, came uppermost, 
while the evangelical element was left to subside, is pre- 
sented in Origen's four books, Tnci dig^oov. This work, 
of which indeed we should speak more confidently if it 
had come down to us in the author's own language, and 



270 CONNEXION OF TPIE CELIBATE WITH THE 

which is known to have undergone some trimming 
under the hand of Rufinus, to whom we are indebted for 
the Latin version now extant — this work professes to 
present a digest of Christian principles, as its title im- 
ports; and, in fact, along with the questionable opinions 
of the benign-minded writer, it sets forth, as then under- 
stood, the orthodox faith, and moreover argues all those 
topics of religion to which the dialectic and metaphysic 
apparatus was really applicable. — And there it stops; — 
nothing — literally nothing, beyond a mere phrase, does 
Origen find to say about the scheme of reconciliation — 
the means, process, freeness, sufficiency, or divine rich- 
ness, of "the redemption that is in Christ." Again and 
again we are told in this treatise, that, at the last, all 
men will be dealt with, pro meritis. Let this be true; 
but there is another truth, which the contrite reader of 
the New Testament thinks he finds clearly affirmed 
there, but which no reader of the *' De principiis" 
would ever surmise to have belonged to the system 
which Origen was expounding. 

The suppression of the gospel, under the hand of the 
ancient masters of logic and pneumatology, is however 
a subject, highly important as it may be, which is foreign 
to my present purpose, and to which I have here advert- 
ed only in order to anticipate an objection, as if I were 
attributing to the ascetic doctrine an extent of influence 
w^hich may be shown to have arisen from more sources 
than one. Let then this be understood. 

Another probable objection I must also exclude. Li 
adducing the polemic treatises of the ancient church, as 
affording instances of the alleged decay of evangelic 
principles and feeling, it may be said, that the appeal is 
neither fair nor conclusive, inasmuch as it does not al- 
low for the peculiar position of the church, as called 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 271 

tipon by the heresies of the times, most of which bore 
upon the trinitariaii doctrine, to insist ahnost exclusively 
upon subjects of that abstruse class: whereas (it may be 
said) only let us look to these same writers when they 
had laid aside their weapons, or to those of their col- 
leagues who stood off from the contest, and we shall 
find that they understood, and personally rejoiced in, 
and warmly promulgated, evangelic principles even as 
the apostles themselves. 

A counter-statement such as this, if it could be sub- 
stantiated, or even made to appear probably correct, 
ought to be at once yielded to. Nothing can be more 
equitable than the general principle on which it proceeds.- 
But can it be made good? In a word, is there any rea- 
son to believe that the great champions of orthodoxy, or 
that their less distinguished contemporaries, when not 
engaged in repelling the assaults of heretics, tliought and 
spoke more, or with greater energy, and vivacity, of the 
doctrines of reconciliation, than may be gathered from 
the tenor of their polemical writings? With the hope 
of resolving this question, I shall now move into a posi-* 
tion, so to speak, alongside of the ancient church — look- 
ing at it on those special occasions which, if any could, 
must be held to be proper for displaying the real and 
intimate feelings of individuals, and of the community 
they belonged to. I proceed then to examine ancient 
Christianity in the concrete; that is to say, as imbodied 
in the characters and sentiments of eminent individuals;- 
and these individuals, we take as their portraits have 
been drawn by the most distinguished of their contem- 
poraries. When a Christian writer undertakes to com- 
pose the panegyric of a departed friend, or eminent 
teacher, whom h€, and others, consider to have reached 



272 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

as near to the point of perfection as is ever permitted to 
humanily, in the present state, it is natural, nay inevi- 
table, that, in arranging the materials of his eulogy, he' 
should so place foremost what, in his esteem, are indeed 
the principal excellencies of the Christian character, as 
shall make manifest his own notions of the general 
scheme of Christian doctrine and practice: in other 
words, such a panegyric, especially when elaborate, and 
when it has evidently been well considered, may fairly 
be regarded as imbodying the writer's confession of 
faith, dogmatic and ethical, only put in the concrete 
form. 1 propose then to look into two or three of the 
principal writers of the Nicene age, either citing, or re- 
ferring to, the most remarkable of those eulogistic or 
funereal compositions with which they abound; only 
reminding the reader that these great writers and 
preachers are never more at home, than while exhaust- 
ing their rhetorical powers upon themes of this particu- 
lar description; and I will ask, at the outset, whether 
there is not a good probability, on all grounds of philo- 
sophical, I mean genuine, reasoning, that, in this line 
of evidence, we shall catch what was indeed the temper, 
character, and tendency of ancient Christianity; our im- 
mediate object being to inquire whether the divine rich- 
ness, and the distinguishing glory of Christianity, as the 
revelation of God's mercy to a lost world, occupied the 
place due to it, in tlie view of the writers in question? 
and then, if the contrary appears to be the fact, we 
shall have the opportunity of seeing whether the fore- 
most place which the gospel should have filled, is not 
in fact usurped by those gnostic and ascetic principles 
of which celibacy was the core. 

In this ease, the question being — Whether certain 



SCHEMi: OF SALVATION. 273 

compositions, many of ihem of considerable length, do, 
or do not, comprise certain elements of truth, there 
are only two methods of proceeding that can be ac- 
cepted as conclusive, the one being that of producing 
the entire tract, oration, or epistle; and the other, that 
of giving the studious reader such references as may fa- 
cilitate his obtaining satisfaction, on the point, for him- 
self. It is manifest that the former method is, in the 
present instance, altogether inadmissible, inasmuch as 
it must swell this tract to the dimensions of a bulky vo- 
lume. I must, therefore, content myself with the lat- 
ter, and, in adopting it, will express my very earnest 
wish that those who, at this time, may be preparing 
themselves to accept ancient Christianity, in the 
stead of apostolic Christianity, would first, and before 
they come to so fatal a decision, give themselves the 
pains to follow the clue I am putting into their hands, 
and to read through and through, the pieces to which 
I shall refer. Can it be denied that this particular line of 
evidence is very likely to expose (or say, exhibit) the 
true character of ancient Christianity? We are taking 
the church by surprise, not unfairly indeed, but just 
when it is sitting for its portrait, blushing and toying be- 
fore some enamoured and favoured Zeuxis or Apelles. 
Will an opponent choose to stake the credit of the Ni- 
cene age on this very ground? I suppose not; but I 
think that those who have studied human nature, and 
who are accustomed to generalize upon the materials of 
history, will grant that the use now to be made of the 
patristic literature, is legitimate, and pertinent to our ar- 
gument. 

I will begin with a very sober writer — a stanch as- 
cetic indeed, and such a one as Evagrius, the historian, 

24 



274 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

(lib. i. cap. 15,) calls a 'living column, holding forth 
the perfection of the monastic and contemplative life." 
I have already quoted him — Isidore of Pelusium, a bi- 
shop, and the intimate friend of Chrysostom, as well as 
of the chief ecclesiastics of his time, and who, if any 
did so, understood well the religious system, dogmatic 
and practical, of his age. He has bequeathed to our 
times two thousand, one hundred, and eighty-three epis- 
tles, or short commentaries and notes, upon subjects of 
all kinds naturally coming within the range of a church- 
man of that age. Punctiliously orthodox, and moreover 
professing the doctrine of the atonement, or propitiato- 
ry work of Christ, here and there, in unexceptionable 
terms; as for instance, in the 73d and 100th epistles of 
the fourth book, and yet, much more often writing like 
a mere stoic, or a Platonist, whose style glitters with a 
few shreds of Christian truth. 

This Isidore (lib. ii. epist. 151) undertakes with much 
diffidence, and almost in despair, the epitaphium of a 
defunct brother, whom he speaks of as having reached 
the very acme of perfection, and with whose various 
praises he fills a folio page: "better was he than all 
praise, the temple of sobriety, the home of prudence, 
the tower of virtue, the metropolis of righteousness, the 
cell of philanthropy, the sacred enclosure of gentleness; 
and to say all in a word, the treasury of all the virtues." 
Then follows the catalogue of these virtues, the fore- 
most being a tyrannous mastery of the bodily appetites, 
ycta-Tpoc, KAt roov fxiTct yfio-Ti^A TtctBa^v j and the last, a modest 
and retiring munificence toward the poor, Tlie bare 
word Christian, does indeed once occur in this eulogy; 
but it contains not so much as a syllable besides, which 
"would enable the reader to guess that the subject of it 
was any other, or any better than many a Mahometan 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 276 

dervish has been; — not a word concerning an humble re- 
liance upon the merits of the Saviour; not a word indi- 
cating it as the belief of this saint, that the best of men 
must, at the last, stand with the most imperfect, as owing 
every thing to sovereign mercy; not a word savouring 
of the temper of the apostles: but, on the contrary, the 
whole tends to convey and support the opinion that no- 
thing could be wanting to those who pursued a spotless 
ascetic course, but just to drop the Bvhtov, and then to 
take their place among seraphs. Is this Christianity? 
but it is the common style of the ancient epitaphic elo- 
quence. Not without reluctance, I must again call the 
venerable Athanasius into court. 

And yet, who shall show cause why we should not 
bring evidence in illustration of the character of Nicene 
Christianity from the writings of Athanasius? — if not, 
where at all is any such evidence to be found? But if 
this be unexceptionable and pertinent testimony, then, 
while we turn to this great man's polemic and dogmatic 
writings, in order to find there the abstract Christianity 
of the times, what better can we do than seek for the 
concrete — the living and imbodied Christian excellence, 
in an elaborate and encomiastic biography, by the same 
hand, of one whom Athanasius holds up to the church 
as a pattern of Christian perfection, and who also was 
in fact so esteemed by the church catholic. We turn 
then to the life of St. Antony, and in doing so; I must 
clear the way for the inference I have in view. St. An- 
tony, with his picturesque infernal legions, has become 
the jest of modern times, and is thought of, much ra- 
ther as an excellent subject for Flemish art, than in any 
more serious connexion. Or if his name has occurred 
on the page of modern church history, it has been hasti- 
ly dismissed^ with a word or two of philosophic scorn. 



276 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

But this loose style of treating such subjects, will not 
serve us any longer; inasmuch as we are now called 
upon to look narrowly into many things which, awhile 
ago, might, without damage, have slept on, in the ob^ 
scurity that so well befits their intrinsic merits. 

This St. Antony then, the transcendental prince of the 
ancient monkery, drew toward himself the wondering 
eyes of all Christendom, from the east to the remotest 
west; and he was allowed to have touched the point of 
Christian perfection as nearly as may be thought possi- 
ble to any in the present life. Multitudes, animated by 
his example, rushed into the desert, and trod his steps. 
His universal reputation obtained for him the title of the 
** Patriarch of Monks." If then we were to go no far- 
ther, but, resting upon the unquestionable rule, that 
whatever, in any age, is the object of universal esteem 
and admiration, may be taken as a sure indication of the 
taste and the opinions of that age, we might, without any 
hazard of error, consider this same pattern-saint of the 
ancient church, as a fair sample of the feelings and no- 
tions of that church. Who can except against the use 
of such a criterion? But this is not all. It might in- 
deed so have been, that, although our ascetic hero had 
become the idol of the vulgar of the Christian commu- 
nity, he yet stood low in the esteem of the well-informed 
leaders of the church; and, if not openly condemned by 
them, yet was but coldly approved, and his extrava- 
gances pointed to in the way of caution. The fact is 
the very reverse; for, in the first place, the great, and 
strong-minded Athanasius — thechief of the '* first three," 
in the esteem of the modern admirers of antiquity — 
charges himself with the task of giving this eminent ex- 
ample of more than human sanctity, to the Christian 
world, in the form of a very elaborate and carefully 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 277 

composed memoir, occupying not less than fifty-four 
folio pages. Here then is the portrait of a picked an- 
cient Christian (so called) at full length, and from the 
pencil of the greatest master of the age. May we not 
learn something of what ancient Christianity was, in 
looking at this picture? But we do not yet state the 
whole case; for we find each great writer of the Nicene 
age, bowing in his turn, and worshipping this same 
idol: — Nazianzen, Jerome, Augustine, Chrysostom. The 
language of the latter is so pertinent to my argument, 
that I cannot but cite it. *' And truly, if you will visit 
the Egyptian deserts, you will find there what is better 
than any paradise: there you will find, in human form, 
innumerable choirs of angels — tribes of martyrs, assem- 
blages of nuns; in a word, the tyrannous empire of Satan 
brought to nothing, and the kingdom of Christ shining 
forth:"* and after much more in the same strain, the elo- 
quent preacher goes on to introduce St, Antony, '' whom," 
after the apostles, Egypt 'Mias produced, blessed and 
great;" and whose life, as related by Athanasius, is said 
to hold forth all that the Christian institute " d tov Xpia-- 
<Tou xoyoi^^ demands. What more than this can we re- 
quire, as authorizing the course we are taking, in consi- 
dering the life of St. Antony, by Athanasius, as a com- 
plete sample of ancient Christianity? 

I heartily wish that, with this very view, the entire 
piece were perused by whoever is still admiring, and 
yet has a misgiving concerning, the gay bubble — anti- 
quity. The question is — Did the ancient celibacy and 
its concomitants, consist with, and promote, evangelic 
doctrine and feeling, or did it thoroughly exclude and 
nullify both! And if this question be answered, as I am 

^ Horn. VIIl. in Matth., torn. vii. pp. 147, 149. 

24* 



278 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

sure it must, we shall still by no means be compelled i(t 
deny sincerity, and a species of devotion, and a high 
measure of certain of the Christian virtues, to St. Antony, 
and to those like him. The memoir before us may, in 
fact, be read with pleasure, and even edification, taken 
for just so much as it is worth; but as an exemplar of 
the Christian character, one may find as good, nay, some 
much better, among the monkish records of the worst 
times of Romanism. In all these fifty-four pages, scarce- 
ly so much as one sentence meets the eye of a kind to 
recall any notions or sentiuients which are distinctively 
Christian. There is indeed an unimpeachable ortho- 
doxy and a thorough-going submissiveness in regard to 
church authority; and tfiere is a plenty of Christianized 
soofTeeism, and there is more than enough of demono- 
logy, and quite enough of miracle; but barely a word 
concerning the propitiatory work of Christ: barely a word 
indicating any personal feeling of the ascetic's own need 
of that propitiation, as the ground of his hope. Not a 
word of justification by faith; not a word of the gracious 
influence of the Spirit, in renewing and cleansing the 
heart; not a word responding to any of those signal pas- 
sages of scripture which make the gospel " glad tidings " 
to guilty man. Drop a very few phrases borrowed from 
the scriptures, and substitute a (e\v, drawn from the 
Koran, and then this memoir of St. Antony, by Athana- 
sius, might serve, as to its temper, spirit, and substance, 
nearly as well for a Maliometan dervish, as for a Chris- 
tian saint. The sort of piety lierein exhibited has grown 
up under almost all religious systems, and samples of it, 
more or less refined, may be discovered in every age 
and country where the religious instinct has been pow- 
erfully developed. 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 279 

Although the task would be far from a pleasing one, 
it might, at this time, be a useful undertaking, to give to 
the Christian world this life of St. Antony, without re- 
trenchment; appending to it, by way of foil, a memoir or 
two, of the worthies and martyrs of our English refor- 
mation. None could fail to discern, in a contrast so 
violent as this, the vast, the immeasurable difference be- 
tween that apostolic Christianity which, by the divine 
mercy, was restored in the sixteenth century, and that 
ancient Christianity — the sooffeeism of the Nicene age, 
which we are now called upon, by the Oxford divines, 
to put in its room! In a parallel such as I am now sup- 
posing, there would be points of agreement, good and 
bad; as, for instance, the ancient ascetics, and the modern 
reformers, were alike pure in their orthodoxy; both, 
moreover, were encumbered and depressed by a demo- 
nological belief, grotesque enough: and let it be added, 
that the one, as well as the other, held their faith as 
Christians with a firmness which, when occasions arose, 
carried themjmanfully through tortures and death. ^But 
how vast is the difference still! The one, in surrender- 
ing themselves (as the church universal had done) to the 
old oriental illusion, or, as we must call it, the gnostic 
principle, had lost their hold of all but the slenderest 
remnants of that evangelic system which, recovered by 
a return to the scriptures, imparted to the others — the 
reformers, a vitality, a force, a feeling, truly apostolic. 
It is impossible not to feel, when the two sets of men 
are placed in close comparison, that the one are mere 
drivellers, doting insufferably about the merest trifles; 
while the others, whatever trifles they might at times 
strive to invest with importance, nevertheless acted 
and spoke and wrote like men and like Christians 
of the apostolic school. Is there a mind so infatuated 



280 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

as that it could, while referring to the temper and cha** 
racter of Paul as a standard, set by the side of it the 
puppet Saint Antony, and our Latimer or Ridley; and 
then choose and prefer the former! and yet we are 
now taught to think and speak of the reformers either 
with a hesitating approval, or even as worthy of our con- 
tempt, if not hatred, while we are enjoined to go back a 
fourteen hundred years, and to gather our Christianity 
anew from the lips of the idiot ascetics of the Nicene age, 
or of the blind doctors who worshipped them! 

It is not to be imagined that the most intelligent body 
of clergy in Europe should give ear, for more than a 
moment, — a moment of illusion, — to advice such as 
this, — advice so pernicious,— and yet not more perni- 
cious, than it is perverse and unutterably absurd. 

But the point we are here engaged with is of such im- 
portance, and it so nearly touches the marrow of the con- 
troversy now on foot, that I must pursue it a little far- 
ther, and, in doing so, it will be at once curious and in- 
structive to turn from the life of St. Antony, by Atha- 
nasius, to the portrait of a far better and wiser man, 
drawn by a greater master tlian even Athanasius — I 
mean the portrait of this same Athanasius, as given to 
us very elaborately by the eloquent Nazianzen. 

Why should we hesitate to look into a formal and au- 
thoritative panegyric of the best and greatest man of the 
ancient church, as imbodying, more or less distinctly, 
every principal element of the religious system of the 
times? It is thus, in fact, that the orator, in this instance, 
regards the task he has undertaken. (See Nazianzen's 
twenty-first oration.) " In praising Athanasius, I shall 
be praising virtue itself; for, in speaking of him, in 
whom were summed up all the virtues, nay, rather, who 
now possesses all, I commend all in one." I must here 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 281 

pass over the exordium, presenting, as it does, a piously 
worded sample of the gnostic style of the age, and 
which describes the blessedness of the " genuine philo- 
sophy." Now, let it be granted that, in the peculiar in- 
stance of this great champion of orthodoxy, the merits 
of Alhanasius, as such, should be made the prominent 
subject of his encomium: yet, would it not seem as if 
some single sentence, or even solitary phrase, calling up 
the recollection of those truths which are the life of 
Christianity, and its distinction, might well have found 
a place in the orator's elaborate panegyric? The perso- 
nal virtues of the saint are particularly enumerated, and 
various excellences of his character, beside his ortho- 
doxy, are fervidly extolled; yet there do not meet the 
eye, in the whole composition, filling four and twenty 
folio pages, hardly three words, which could suggest to 
an uninformed reader the idea that Christianity comprised 
any element distinguishing it from the Grecian philoso- 
phy — the doctrine of the Trinity excepted. Few traces 
do we here find of the gospel; and no allusion, ever so 
remote, to the doctrines which are the main subjects of 
the Pauline epistles. Or to come nearer home, never 
would it be surmised, from any thing occurring in this 
oration, that there are principles of Christian belief, such 
as those so clearly imbodied in the 9th, 10th, 1 1th, 15th, 
17th, and 3 1st articles of the English church. Grant 
it, that we should not demand, in a commemorative ora- 
tion, a logical synopsis of doctrine; but may we not de- 
mand, from a Christian preacher, and a bishop, that, as 
often as he stands before the people, he should afford 
them the means of knowing that his own heart, as a 
harp in tune, responds, in all its wires, to the harmony 
of heaven? Can we imagine any one of the leaders of 



382 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

the English reformation to have pronounced Nazianzen's 
21st oration? or would any one of them have concluded 
any such harangue, had they pronounced it, with an in- 
vocation of the dead Athanasius, now to look down upon 
him with favour, and to aid him in the government of 
his church! No such incongruity, no such contradiction, 
can be even imagined to have had place; for every one 
feels that Nazianzen's Christianity, and the Christianity 
of Jewell, Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, Hooper, were 
two systems, the one excluding, or forgetting, that which 
the other made the most account of; the one dry, ab- 
struse, extravagant, turgid, formal, vapid; the other, cor- 
dial, rich, efficacious; and, if tinged with superstition, 
yet immeasurably more concerned with the momentous 
realities than with the mere rites of piety. 

It would be an error of serious consequence to sup- 
pose that the zealous archbishop of Alexandria was no 
better a Christian than we might gather reasons for 
thinking him, from the language of his panegyrist. His 
various writings forbid any such comfortless supposi- 
tion. Athanasius was not only better than Nazianzen's 
portrait of him; but better, and the same may be said in 
a thousand instances, than his own notions of Christi- 
'anity (considered as a system) would have made him. 
While he and his contemporaries, took up the foreign 
gnostic element, the presence of which deranged the 
entire scheme of the gospel economy, he and they, or 
many of them, so retained their hold, personally, of its 
genuine and vitalizing principles, as that they still drew 
sap enough from the vine to adorn their branches with 
clusters of fruit. We may properly denounce and reject 
a particular form of Christianity, without being com- 
pelled to unchristianize those who have known nothing 
better. 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 283 

But I must return a moment to Nazianzen. It might 
be thought, and with some appearance of reason, that, 
on so special an occasion as the one above referred to, 
and when he had to hold up, to popular admiration, the 
great champion of orthodoxy, the one prominent subject, 
the doctrine of the Trinity, would naturally exclude 
other topics of theoretic or practical theology. Let it 
be granted then; and on this supposition, we can do no 
better than turn from the panegyric of Athanasius, to 
that of Cyprian. In this instance at least, the remote- 
ness of the subject from any local, temporary, ecclesi- 
astical, or theological interest, may fairly be held to 
have exempted the orator from any such preoccupation 
of mind, as might have precluded the full and sponta- 
neous expression of his feelings, as a Christian. The 
eulogium of the martyr of Carthage, is surely open 
ground; and in this instance we shall not fail to discover 
those features of Christianity which were foremost in 
the view of the speaker. 

Of what sort then is this florid oration? (the 18th.) 
Not a whit more evangelical than the one already re- 
ferred to. Utterly devoid is it of those notions and modes 
of feeling w^hich, in the strictest and most proper sense, 
are Christian. A dry, punctilious orthodoxy, with more 
than a spice of offensive superstition, are its character- 
istics: there is indeed, what we may find elsewhere, and 
among heathen philosophers, a high contempt of the 
world, and of its pomps, luxuries, and vanities; but there 
is not even a beam of that splendour — the radiance of 
heaven, which, in t!ie scriptures themselves, gladdens 
the hearts of the contrite. If the ten lines concerning 
Christ, the '• protomartyr," may be urged in mitigation 
of this averment, let them be produced; but they amount 
only to a profession which no Christian could avoid 



284 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

making; and such a turn is given to the allusion to the 
sufferings of Christ, as serves to ally the doctrine of 
the atonement with the dim theology of the times. 
" Many things there are indeed, which tend to lead us 
into the better way; and many which train us in virtue, 
such as reason, law, tKe prophets, the apostles, and even 
the sufferings of Christ, the protomartyr, who ascended 
the cross, leading me thither, that he might attach to it 
my sin, and triumph over the serpent, and sanctify the 
tree, and vanquish pleasure, and rescue Adam, and re- 
store the fallen image (of God in man.)" 

Let, however, this profession pass for as much as it 
can be worth, conjoined with what follows; and I do 
not see another line that is equally, or in any proper 
sense, evangelic. But what is it that follows? Such 
things as these — a love story (whence derived does not 
appear) but the purport of which is, that Cyprian, be- 
fore his conversion, being desperately enamoured of a 
beautiful nun, had pursued her so importunately as to 
reduce her almost to despair. In this terrible extremity, 
to whom should she have recourse, but to the blessed 
Mary, the queen and patroness of virgins: not indeed as 
if forgetting God, and her Saviour — g^/ tcv 6gov aa^TAcpivyity 
but, as the readiest and surest means of obtaining im- 
mediate assistance. " She supplicated the Virgin Mary,- 
tKBrivovo-oL, beseeching her to afford aid to a virgin in 
peril; and, by the medicine of fasting and prostrations 
on the bare earth, she farthered her purpose, partly that, 
by these means, she might tarnish those charms which 
were the cause of her trouble, and so remove fuel from 
the flame; and partly, that, by her sufferings and humi- 
liations she might propitiate God: for indeed by notfiing 
is God so well pleased, BipctTivir^t, as by the sufferings 



SCHEME OF SALVATION^ 285 

of the body, and it is to tears that he is wont to render 
his compassion." 

This is " antiquity;" this is " catholic teaching;" this 
is that "perfect form of our religion," which, as we are 
now told, was at length brought out, after a three hun- 
dred years' preparation, or concoction of its rude ele- 
ments: this is the venerable system which we are to put 
in the place of the Christianity of the reformers? Many 
who, seduced by fair words, and a very partial, and 
therefore fallacious exhibition of what ancient Christi- 
anity really was, are giving in their submission to what 
is called Catholicism j would be horror-stricken did they 
fully know what this Catholicism actually includes. 

If it should be said that passages such as the above 
are but spots on the disk of the sun, and need be taken 
no account of, our part then will be, in the place of 
every single quotation, to produce a hundred; and all of 
the same dark colour. Is it possible that the gospel, 
such as the apostles gave it to the world, should consist 
with the practice of praying to the Virgin Mary? No; 
if there be any consistency in religious principles. Nor, 
in fact, did these irreconcilable elements cohere: the 
worse presently expelled the better, and brought with it 
every kindred superstition: — as for instance — 

— After the executioner had done his office, says our 
orator, the body (of Cyprian) strange to say, was not to 
be found, it<pctvi? nv : the " treasure had, however, been 
taken care of by a pious lady, who long concealed it, 
whether it were merely that it pleased God thus to ho- 
nour and reward her piety; or whether to prove us, and 
to try if the deprivation of the sacred relics would really 
distress us. However this might be, at lengtli private 
advantage was made to yield to the public welfare, and 
the God of the martyrs brought the sacred remains to 

25 



286 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

light! What honours have not been granted to women!" 
. , . Then follow the innumerable miracles of heal- 
ing effected by this holy dust! all which those were 
ready to attest, who had made proof of their efficacy. 

To translate at length the nauseous drivelling of Na- 
zianzen in this, and similar instances, is a task I must 
decline: — let those who are hovering between Christ!^ 
anity, and " catholic antiquity," read it for themselves; 
or let the Oxford divines give to the English public, 
whole and entire, the festival orations of the two Gre- 
gorys, and of Chrysostom. All would then know, fairly 
and at once, the extent to which they will have to go in^^ 
accepting the latter, and in relinquishing the former. 

Fitly, in this instance, as in others, Nazianzen in- 
cludes, in his peroration, a devout prayer to the glorified 
martyr. *' And thou, from thy seat, look down upon 
us propitiously . . . aiding us in the government of the 
flock." That this was not a rhetorical flourish appears,- 
not only from the seriousness and frequency of similar 
invocations, but from a formal profession which the 
speaker, in the funeral oration for his father, makes of 
his opinion on this point of *' catholic belief." (See the 
19th oration.) *' I am persuaded," says Nazianzen, 
" that our father's intercession now avails us more than 
his teaching did while present with us in the body; now 
that he has got near to God, has shaken off the fetters of 
the body, and, freed from the mud of earth, approaches 
naked the naked." . . . 

It might be well to follow this same father through 
his panegyric orations. Let the diligent inquirer do so^ 
and if he finds, here and there, expressions fitting a 
Christian preacher, consider always with what ingre- 
dients these shining fragments are mingled. 

It may, however, seem probable that, although Nazian- 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 287 

zen's florid eloquence might conceal the better and purer 
elements of Cyprian's Christian character, these would 
not fail to make their appearance if we could look into 
some memoir of the martyr, composed by a contempo- 
rary, and one, therefore, who was nearer, by a century, 
to the apostolic age. Such an opportunity is then actu- 
ally afforded to us in the Life of St. Cyprian, as written 
by his own deacon, his constant attendant and friend, 
Pontius. Be it that Nazianzen plays the part of the 
mere orator, ambitious to shine, and looking at his ob- 
ject through the haze of time, and the mists of supersti- 
tion: but Pontius was the disciple and intimate com- 
panion of the martyr, and the sharer of his perils. 
What materials then does this authentic record present, 
pertinent to our argument? — we find in it the same abso- 
lute destitution of evangelic sentiments, and the same 
ascetic feeling. The deacon commences his portrait of 
his master precisely in the style that characterizes the 
fathers, from Tertullian downwards. "The preserva- 
tion of continence, and the treading under foot the con- 
cupiscence of the flesh by a robust and thorough sanc- 
tity," was, w^e are told, the prime rudiment of Cyprian's 
Christianity, and the most direct means, in his esteem, 
of rendering his bosom the fit receptacle of truth! 
The modern reader should be on his guard against the 
error of attaching, either a protestant or a classical sense, 
to the terms which meet us in this instance, and on every 
page of ecclesiastical literature; and which, as there em- 
ployed, carry always a technical sense; as, for instance, 
in this place, sanctimonia, is not holiness, either iii an 
apostolic, or a modern sense of the term; but the sancti- 
moniousness, or factitious purity of the ascetic life: the 
concupiscentia carnis, is the abstract affection, proper 
to our nature, not its irregular or depraved excesses: the 



288 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

continentiaj is not purity of heart and manners, but ce- 
libacy: and the pectus idoneum, is such a preparation of 
the animal nature, as, according to the gnostic notion, 
was the prerequisite of all correspondence with the Su- 
preme Being. The rest of this Life of Cyprian is oc- 
cupied with the martyr's virtues, his charity, diligence, 
courage, contempt of the world, and so forth; — virtues, 
springing from motives far more powerful than any that 
were known to heathen philosophy, and reaching a prac- 
tical extent in proportion, and such as heathenism had 
never dreamed of. What stoics have ever acted as Cy- 
prian did, during the pestilence at Carthage? what stoics 
have ever died as he did? Nevertheless, Cyprian's vir- 
tue would be much better described as a stoicism puri- 
fied and animated, than as Christianity imbodied. None 
could fail to feel powerfully the vast difference between 
apostolic (and protestant) Christian sentiment on the one 
hand, and gnosticised ancient Christianity on the other, 
who would do themselves the justice to read Pontius's 
Life of Cyprian, by the side of any memoir of the mar- 
tyr bishops of the English reformation. Was not Cy- 
prian, then, a good man, and a Christian too? Who can 
doubt it? but yet not nearly so well taught a Christian, 
as have been scores of Romanist bishops and monks, of 
the middle ages. If, therefore, we choose to reject the 
reformers as our masters in theology, it were far better 
to stop short near at hand in the church of Rome, where 
we may find spirituality, as well as fervour, and a more 
full expansion of doctrines, than to go up to the Nicene, 
or the Cyprianic age, where all is dim and unformed. 
This, I am persuaded, will be felt and frankly acknow- 
ledged by all open to conviction, who, laying aside their 
terror of popery, will deliberately and calmly compare 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 289 

the best Romish writers with the best Nicene or ante- 
Nicene fathers. It may be very true that a return to Ro- 
manism, on the part of the English church, would in- 
volve some very awkward practical consequences, which 
are not involved in a return to ancient Christianity, and 
which we might bring about, as it were, silently and un- 
observed. But if, political and ecclesiastical considera- 
tions apart, we were to entertain the question of such a 
proposed change, on purely religious grounds, I verily 
believe that we should see reason enough for accepting 
the former alternative, rather than the latter. 

I do not suppose that any champion of the fathers, 
calling himself a protestant — any one who yet holds by 
the articles and homilies of the English church, will 
bring forward a writer like Gregory Nyssen, with the 
view of counteracting the impression made by the pas- 
sages cited, or referred to above. All know that, be- 
tween Nyssen's Christianity and popery, the distinction, 
if any, is of the nicest kind — hard to catch, and harder 
to keep one's hold of. I leave him therefore, much as 
my argument might be served by adducing the evidence 
he furnishes of the errors of his times. 

The temper, as well as the style and method of the 
Latin theologians, differs much from that which distin* 
guishes the eastern and Alexandrian churches' writers. 
And yet, notwithstanding the contrast presented by the 
richness, the exuberance, the refinement and subtlety, 
and the theoretic tendency of the latter, and the severi- 
ty and practical directness of the former, the sovereign 
influence of the system to which the one as well as the 
other had bowed, is every where apparent. In the place 
of the gospel, as preached by the apostles, and " wor- 
thy of all acceptation," and equally necessary for all, the 

25* 



290 CONNEXION OF THE CELIbXtE WITH THE 

church had adopted a transcendental mysticism, the ho- 
nours and benefits of which were offered to a very few; 
while to the many, instead either of the free gospel, or 
of the prerogatives of the upper species of virtue, the 
church offered its sacraments, as tangible conveyances 
of so much grace as might secure salvation to those 
whose faith and virtue were of a vulgar stamp. 

In whatever respects Ambrose of Milan may differ 
from the Gregorys, or from Chrysostom, he is thorough- 
ly in accordance with them, so far as the above general 
description goes:— they indeed may incline toward the 
mild, abstracted, and imaginative sooffeeism, — or Plato- 
nism; while he, and the Latins, less given to meditation, 
tmd more conversant with the business of life, leaned 
toward the stern and stoical system: they, speaking of 
Christianity as a scheme oi philosophy [ihe term con- 
stantly employed by the Greek fathers) these calling it a 
system of discipline. The general product, however, of 
the two institutes was the same, and both alike dimmed, 
or removed from its place, the glory of the gospel. 

To the instances which I have adduced above, it may 
perhaps be objected that the occasions on which the for- 
mal orations I have quoted were uttered, were not the 
most favourable for bringing forth the intimate and per- 
sonal sentiments of the speakers, as Christians; and that, 
just on these annual festivals, the temptation to make a 
show of sparkling rhetoric overcame the better feelings 
of the preacher. — Be it so. Let us then take up an in- 
stance in which, if in any that is conceivable, a preach- 
er may be supposed to have had his best and most cha- 
racteristic Christian sentiments so powerfully wrought 
upon, as to carry him far above the range of the inferior 
motives of intellectual ambition. When is it that our 
modern pulpit orators are seen, if not to the greatest ad- 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 291 

vantage as orators, yet to the greatest as men, personal- 
ly imbued with the quickening motives, and animated 
by the hopes of the gospel? Surely it is, when the 
fountains of grief having been broken up, by some sud- 
den bereavement, whatever, in their ordinary style, may 
have been formal, or artificial, or perfunctory, is tho- 
roughly dispelled by the agony of the heart; and when 
the energies of faith impart life and power to every word 
that is uttered. We may then, on the ground of this ge- 
neral rule, very properly make our way into the crowd- 
ed episcopal church at Milan, at the solemn hour when 
the holy father — Ambrose, smitten wdth the keenest 
shaft of sorrow, and yet compressing and commanding 
his tumultuous grief, harangues the multitude, a few 
days only after the death of his beloved brother, Saty- 
rus. Now% surely, if at any time, we shall hear the 
Christian freely uttering Christian sentiments; and now, 
if ever, in the eulogistic enumeration of the departed 
saint's virtues, w^e shall see what ancient Christianity 
was in the concrete, and when the most fully developed. 
Of the two orations pronounced on this mournful oc- 
casion, the second, on the faith of the Resurrection, we 
may pass by, noticing only the proof it furnishes of that 
coldness of the affections, and mere intellectuality, which 
has ever been the fruit of the ascetic system: nothing 
can be more chilling than this discourse, considered in 
reference to the circumstances which attended its de- 
livery. The first oration pronounced in the great church 
whither the corpse of Satyrus had been carried, presents 
those perpetual antitheses, and smart turns intended to 
catch the ear of the vulgar, which belong rather to the 
bad taste of the times, than to the mind of the indi- 
vidiuil speaker; they indicate, however, the same in- 



1192 CONNEXION OF THE CELIISATE WITH THE 

tellectual frigidity, and that thoroughly sophisticated sen- 
timent, which the religious system had brought in with 
it. 

Ambrose professes the tenderest affection to have sub- 
sisted between himself and his deceased brother, who 
had been his solace, stay, and adviser, amid the cares 
and labours of his public life. Natural affection had, in 
this instance, only cemented the more intimately an at* 
tachment which the amiable and exalted qualities of Sa- 
tyrus must alone have rendered fervent and devoted. 
This beloved brother, after having narrowly escaped 
from shipwreck, was attacked soon after his return to 
Italy, with an acute disorder, which snatched him from 
the fondness of his family and friends, and from the pub- 
lic service. Alas! it appeared from the event, that he 
had asked only of " St. Laurence the martyr," — what 
had indeed been granted to his prayers~a safe passage! 
Would that he had prayed also for length of years! Let 
not the protestant reader, who may lately have heard 
Ambrose named as one of the great three, to whom we 
are to look for our idea of finished Christianity, let him 
not be startled at this praying to a saint. Ambrose in 
the west, as well as Nazianzen, Nyssen, Chrysostom, 
in the east, and others, too many to name, had con- 
vinced himself that no prayers were so well expedited 
on high, as those which were presented by a saint and 
martyr already in the skies! In fact, a good choice as 
to the " patrocinium," was the main point in the busi- 
ness of prayer. These matters were, however, regu- 
lated by a certain propriety and conventional usage,- — » 
may we say, etiquette: it was not on every sort of occa- 
sion that the Virgin was to be troubled with the wants 
and wishes of mortals: each saint had, indeed, come to 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 293 

have his department; and each was applied to in his par- 
ticular line. In connexion with subjects such as this 
how can one be serious? unless indeed considerations 
are admitted that agitate the mind with emotions of in- 
dignation and disgust. 

It was, however, a consolation to Ambrose, in the loss 
of his brother, that he had lived to return to Milan, 
where the sacred dust would be at all times accessible, 
affording to him means of devotion of no ordinary value 
— " habeo sepulcrum," says he, " super quod jaceam, et 
commeyidahiliorem Deo futurum esse me credam, quod 
supra sancti corporis ossa requiescam." Ambrose was 
truly a gainer by the death of his brother; for in place of 
his mere bodily presence, as a living coadjutor, he had 
the justifying merits of his bones, and the benefit of his 
intercession in heaven! Ungracious task indeed is it to 
adduce these instances of blasphemous superstition, as 
attaching to a name like that of Ambrose; but what 
choice is left us w^ien, as now, the Christian commu- 
nity, little suspecting what i^ implied in the advice, 
are enjoined to take their faith and practice from the di- 
vines of the Nicene age, and from Ambrose, Athanasius, 
and Basil, especially? 

The weeping orator having spent a little his verbose 
grief, returns upon his path, in order to set before the 
people — the plebs sancta, this exemplar of virtue, or 
compendium of Christian graces. It is certain therefore 
that this highly finished portrait of one so well known 
to him, and so fondly admired, will contain whatever 
was, in the preacher's opinion, most important to the 
Christian character: — the instance is then every thing 
we could wish for, considered as a criterion of ancient 
Christianity, in the concrete. Without a play upon 



^94 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

words, it may properly be called an experimentum crucis. 
We proceed then to analyze this most conclusive record. 
What were the virtues and graces of Satyrus — a perfect 
Christian after the Nicene model? 

First comes his reverential regard to the rites of re- 
ligion; of which a striking instance is afforded. The 
vessel in which Satyrus was returning to Italy having 
•got on the rocks, he, not as yet initiated in the higher 
mysteries, and not regenerated, yet not fearing death, 
but fearing lest he should die without them, had recourse 
to those on board who had in their custody the conse- 
crated elements (ordinarily carried, in a journey, as a safe- 
guard against all perils) and having obtained them, wrapped 
them in a stole, or sacrificial kerchief, which he tied about 
his neck; and, thus armed, in any event, fearlessly threw 
himself into the sea: itaque his se tectum atque munitum 
satis credens, alia auxilia non desideravit. A good be- 
ginning, is it not? The modern admirers of antiquity 
«eem to be offended when they are accused of " putting 
the sacraments in the place of the Saviour;" but now 
they are turning us over to masters of divinity who re- 
commend what, if it do not imply some such substitu- 
tion, is altogether unintelligible. Thrust this same in- 
cident into the memoirs of any one of the insulted fa- 
thers of the English reformation: will it suit the connex- 
ion, and consist with the spirit and doctrine of the con- 
text? It would not, and those are miserably betraying 
the English church, who, under cover of a mystification 
of plain and untoward facts, are striving to put the de- 
based Christianity of Ambrose, Jerome, and Basil, in the 
place of the gospel recovered by its founders. 

But we proceed with the virtues of Satyrus, the list 
oi which includes fortitude, and pious gratitude, evinced 



u 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 295 

in his thanksgiving on account of the deliverance above 
referred to; — gratitude, the expression of which gave 
evidentie of, and augmented his faith, and a faith such as 
had enabled him to confide almost as calmly in the effi-- 
cacy of the consecrated elements tied about his neck, as 
he could have done had they actually passed into his sto- 
mach! Next comes an instance of his cautious regard to 
legitimate church authority. Then, the childlike sim- 
plicity of his disposition and manner, and his singular 
modesty — pudor and purity, in speech as well as deport- 
ment and person. And such an admirer of chastity was 
he, and yet so abhorrent of ostentation, that^ " when 
urged by his family to marry, having resolved to main- 
tain his purity, he rather dissembled his purpose, than 
professed his determination. Who then shall not ad- 
mire a man who, not wanting in magnanimity (sense of 
distinction) and standing as he did between a sister pro- 
fessing virginity, and a brother of high rank in the 
church, yet affected not the honours of either condition, 
while himself replete with the virtues of both?^ 

The frugality and temperance of Satyrus kept pace 
with his chastity; all which were cemented by the cardi- 
nal virtue justice, and a regard to the claims of all, whe- 
ther those claims were of the definite or indefinite class, 
and not least, tho^e of the poor. Such is this portrait; 
and the preacher, having satisfied his own conception of 
the congeries of Christian virtues, indulges again in the 
sorrow which yet he reproves, and concludes by com- 
mending the *' innocent soul," as an offering to God. 
Innocent, that is to say, one of those whom Ambrose, 
in another place, (De Poenitentia, lib. ii. sect. 10,) says it 
was easier to find, than any who had duly practised pe- 
nitence. 



296 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

But not one line does this funereal panegyric contain 
breathing an evangelic feeling, or adverting to the great 
principles of the gospel! It would be wrong to speak 
of this elaborate composition as defective, or ambiguous, 
or erroneous, in relation to the leading truths of Chris- 
tianity; for it touches them not even in the remotest man- 
ner. As well say that the Phaedo of Plato is wanting 
in evangelic perspicuity, or that Cicero, De natura deo- 
rum, does not fully express the doctrine of the thirty- 
nine articles. Cicero, Seneca, Epictetus, any one we 
may choose to name, is as evangelic as Ambrose, so far 
as the composition before us goes. Nor is the contrast 
more violent between the writings of heathen moralists, 
and the epistles of Paul, than that which offers itself 
when, by the side of the inspired writings, we place this 
Nicene oration. 

The inference I draw from so signal an instance would 
be in no degree invalidated by adducing, from the same 
writer, passages of an evangelic aspect. Such passages 
would either come under the designation of dry dogma- 
lie statements; or they would express those occasional 
outbursts of a better feeling which enable us yet to be- 
lieve that these writers were personally better than their 
system. But then, the Romanist writers, even those of 
the darkest times, may readily be supplied with a simi- 
lar apology. And how much more full and satisfactory 
is such an apology in the instance of more modern Ro- 
manists, as for example, those of the Port Royal school! 
Whatever may be the demerits of Romanism, as com- 
pared with Nicene Christianity, it is not to be denied, 
that, in fervour and evangelic feeling, too, its best wri- 
ters are decisively superior to those of the earlier lime. 
In fact, it would be extremely difficult to collect, any 
where, from those distinctively called — the fathers, a 



SCHEME OF SALVAtlON. 297 

mass of Christian sentiment, such as might be brought 
together, with the greatest ease, from the devotional and 
practical works of the middle and later ages. It would 
be perfectly safe to accept a challenge to adduce three 
passages from Romanist authors, for every one from 
the Nicene fathers, such as would satisfy a modern pro- 
testant ear. 

Or the comparison might be instituted on a rather dif- 
ferent ground, as for example, on that of the presence 
or absence of expressions, utterly offensive to every sound 
Christian feeling; and which it is very hard to reconcile 
with the supposition of genuine piety, in the writer. 
Now, it must be confessed, that many things meet the eye 
on the pages of the great writers of the Nicene age, of 
a kind that finds no parallels in the accredited and most 
esteemed Romanist writers. Altogether, those proprie- 
ties, both moral and religious, which modern refinement 
demands — and properly demands, are far better observed 
by the later, than they were by the earlier authors; and 
especially will this appear to be true, if we confine our- 
selves to those of the highest reputation, respectively. 
None, I think, will attempt to deny this advantage, as 
belonging to the Romish church, in regard to the obser- 
vance of the moral decencies of style, or subject; nor 
do I see that it can be refused in relation to theological 
proprieties; as for instance — 

Ephrem the Syrian, a highly esteemed writer of the 
Nicene school, and one who, ascetic as he is, may be 
read with pleasure and advantage by those who are bet- 
ter taught than himself, and who know how to supply 
his deplorable deficiencies in evangelic principle, gives 
ns a story to the following effect. Abraham the hermit, 
his own intimate friend, had had consigned to his care, 

26 



298 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

in the wilderness (alas the luckless girl,) an orphan 
niece, the heiress of an ample fortune, then in her se- 
venth year, whom her relatives (such were the notions 
of the times,) conveniently disposed of, by incarcerating 
her in a cell, destitute of every comfort, adjoining that 
of the hermit. In this den the poor girl's hours were occu- 
pied in the performance of menial offices for her uncle, 
and in the routine of penance and devotion. It was 
her misfortune, moreover, to be very handsome, so the 
legend runs. Seen and seduced by a monk, who, on 
pretence of spiritual perplexity, frequented the holy se- 
clusion, she abandoned, at once, her profession, her pri- 
son, and her keeper; who, after awhile, discovers her 
shame, and the place of her sojourn; whither he follows 
her in disguise, acting a part the most foreign to his ha- 
bits. At last, discovering himself to the fair runaway, 
he brings her to tears and shame, and among the induce- 
ments, by means of which he labours to restore her to 
virtue, and to the ascetic life, he says, with the view of 
obviating her despair of forgiveness, " Mary — I will be 
answerable for thee before God in the day of judgment. 
I will repent for thee on account of this course of sin.- — 
Upon me be thy sin, my child; of my hands shall God 
require this thy sin; only listen to me, and return with 
me to thy place." Ephrem. p. 231. Oxford edition. 

It is only the inferior class of Romanist writers who, 
in any such way, are found to outrage all propriety. 
How miserably must those have lost the consciousness 
of their own position, as sinners, needing mercy, who 
could have fallen into the habit of making themselves 
responsible for the sins of others! 

Until of late, in perusing the fathers, we have been 
accustomed to take very little, or no account, of flagrant 
impieties such as this: and passing them, perhaps, with 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 299 

a smile, have simply said — " Such was the style of the 
times." But we must no longer allow ourselves this 
sort of easy philosophic indifference. The Nicene fa- 
thers, with their superstitions and their sooffeeism, are 
now to be forced upon the English church, in the room 
of her wise, holy, manly, and Christian-like founders. 
The substitution is horrid: it must be resisted; and to re- 
sist it, and to dissipate the illusions which favour the 
traitorous attempt, the real quality of these writers, and 
of their theological system, must be laid bare, without 
scruple or mercy. 

Now it will not do, slightly, to say in reply — " Oh, 
the fathers had their blemishes, no doubt, and so have 
the best writers, of the best ages; and we leave these 
minor imperfections where we find them; and we think 
the bringing them forward is an instance of ill-directed 
industry." This mode of disposing of the difficulty 
will not meet the occasion. — A blemish may be either a 
spot or stain, tarnishing the surface of a solid and pre- 
cious substance; or it may be a corroded speck, or a 
worn point, or edge, in the mere gilding that hides a 
worthless material: a blemish, of the former sort, may 
be removed, with equal ease and advantage to the body 
to which it has attached; but to rub and scour an atte- 
nuated gilding, what is it but to reveal, at every stroke, 
the vile brass, or wood, or clay, to which we had fond- 
ly attributed a hundred times its intrinsic value? 

The lives, labours, and writings of our English refor- 
mers, are disfigured by many blemishes; grant it. But 
it is also true, that, in making ourselves acquainted with 
them, our own minds being imbued with biblical senti- 
ments, we become more and more impressed with the 
conviction of their solid excellence: — they were men of 
JGrod, and, taught as they were from above, whatever 



300 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

may have been their faults, they understood and pro- 
fessed what is the most momentous in the Christian sys- 
tem. The result of an equally thorough examination 
of the Nicene fathers, and under the guidance of ge- 
nuine principles, will be, if not of an opposite, yet of 
a very dilTerent kind; and we shall be compelled to con- 
fess, that those vital elements of truth which the one set 
of men had recovered, under the divine guidance, from 
the scriptures, the other set did but dimly discern, and 
faintly hold, and were continually surrendering, for a 
mere phantom of piety. 

The limits of this tract, and the range of subjects it 
must embrace, render it impracticable for me to acquit 
myself otherwise than very imperfectly, of the task I 
have undertaken; but I shall be content if I shall have 
induced any to pursue, for themselves, the line of inquiry 
which I have indicated. If a hundred instances were 
added to the few already given, the complexion of all 
would be the same. That is to say, whenever we look 
at ancient Christianity, in the concrete, or as imbodied 
in the lives, sentiments, and practices of those who en- 
joyed the highest reputation for sanctity, we find, ever 
and again, the same ingredients, and these placed nearly 
in the same order; and with the same utter want of evan- 
gelic feeling. — There is foremost, the high-wrought as- 
cetic virtue, and its indispensable condition — virginity; 
or, what we may fairly call, an illuminated stoicism: 
then follow the virtues which best harmonize with the 
ascetic life, and the motives of which are drawn, with 
much effect, from the Christian doctrine of another life. 
The accessories — sometimes the leading excellences of 
this order of piety, were, a prostrate submission to 
church authority, and such a regard to the sacraments, 
especially to the holy eucharist, as is not surpassed, a 



SCHEME OF SALVATION, 301 

whit, by the boldest professors of transubstanliation. 
This description applies, with hardly a shade of differ- 
ence, to all instances intervening between the times of 
Tertullian, and the age of Gregory I. 

To afford a digested summary of the style of expound- 
ing scripture by the Nicene writers, and such as should 
fairly represent it, seems altogether impracticable; and, 
especially, because nothing short of lengthened quota- 
tions would enable the reader to judge the whole ques- 
tion. A sample or two may be offered, merely in illus- 
tration of v/hat is meant by the broad assertion — That 
the notions universally entertained of religious celibacy, 
and of its high merits and importance, had the effect of 
dislodging the most momentous truths of the Christian 
system: as thus — 

I suppose that, in expounding the parable of the ten 
virgins, most modern and protestant writers have consi- 
dered the solemn meaning it conveys as intended for the 
benefit of Christians at large, and by no means as re- 
stricted to the members of a spiritual aristocracy. More- 
over, it has, I think, been generally understood, that our 
Lord, by " the oil in the lamp," meant that principle of 
genuine piety which distinguishes his true followers from 
mere pretenders, or professors; so that the general pur- 
port of the parable is to incite us to make serious in- 
quiry into the state of our hearts, as "alive to God," or 
not. But it is in no such manner that the illustrious 
Chrysostom understands, or interprets, the allegory: 
let us hear him, {ttzoi fAirctvoicLg, Horn. III. tom. ii. p. 348.) 

" What! hast thou not understood from the instance 
of the ten virgins, in the gospel, how that those who, 
although they were proficients in virginity, yet not pos- 
sessing the (virtue of) almsgiving, were excluded from 

26* 



^93 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

the nuptial banquet? Truly, I am ashamed, and 

blush and weep when I hear of the foolish virgin. When 
I hear the very name, I blush to think of one who, after 
she had reached such a point of virtue, after she had 
gone through the training of virginity, after she had thus 
winged the body aloft toward heaven, (sheer gnosticism 
this,) after she had contended for the prize with the 
powers on high, (the angels,) after she had undergone 
the toil, and had trodden under foot the fires of pleasure, 
to hear such a one named, and justly named, a fool, be- 
cause that, after having achieved the greater labours, (of 
virtue,) she should be wanting in the less! .... Now, 
the fire (of the lamps) is — Virginity, and the oil is — 
Almsgiving. And, in like manner as the flame, unless 
supplied with a stream of oil, disappears, so virginity, 

unless it have almsgiving, is extinguished But 

now, who are the venders of this oil? — The poor who, 
for receiving alms, sit about the doors of the church. 
And for how much is it to be bought? — for what you 
will. I set no price upon it, lest, in doing so, I should 
exclude the indigent. For, so much as you have, make 
this purchase. Hast thou a penny? — purchase heaven, 
ttyofita-ov Tov ove^ctvov, not, indeed, as if heaven were cheap; 
but the Master is indulgent. Hast thou not even a pen- 
ny? give a cup of cold water, for he hath said, &c. . . . 
Heaven is on sale, and in the market, and yet we mind 
it not! Give a crust, and take back paradise; give the 
least, and receive the greatest; give the perishable, re- 
ceive the imperishable; give the corruptible, receive the 
incorruptible. If there were a fair, and a plenty of pro- 
visions to be had, at the vilest rate, — all to be bought for 
a song, — would ye not realize your means, and postpone 
other business, and secure to yourselves a share in such 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 303 

dealing? Where, then, things corruptible are in view, 
do ye show such diligence, and where the incorruptible, 
such slugojishness, and such proneness to fall behind? 
Give to the needy, so that, even if thou sayest nothing 
for thyself, a thousand tongues may speak in thy behalf; 
thy charities standing up, and pleading for thee. Alms 
are the redemption of the soul, xurpcv -^v/jg io-nv iXi}i/uo<rvv}j. 
And, in like manner, as there are set vases of water at 
the church gates, for washing the hands; so are beggars 
sitting there, that thou mayest (by their means) wash 
the hands of thy soul. Hast thou washed thy palpable 
hands in w^ater? wash the hands of thy soul in alms- 
giving!" 

The preacher then makes an allusion, such as no pro- 
testant would disallow, to the context, '* inasmuch as ye 
did it," &;c.: and then proceeds, *'My brethren, alms- 
giving is a great matter. Let us embrace it, to which 
nothing is equal ^g ovSiv lo-ov, for it is sufficient for the 
wiping out of whatever sins" (Chrysostom's expression 
KAt Axxctcy d/Aa'^rictg, must Carry this sense, or something 
like it) "and for warding off condemnation. Even if 
thou standest speechless, it shall plead for thee; rather I 
should say, there is no need of words, to him who has 
gained the mouths of the poor. Give what thou hast, 
for the reward is according to intention, not of constraint 
. . . But I return to the virgins." . . . 

What follows, although the citation be long, is too 
pertinent to our present purpose to be omitted. 

'* But what is it which, after so many labours, these 
(foolish) virgins hear? — I know you not! which is no- 
thing less than to say that virginity, vast treasure as it 
is, may be useless! Think of them (the foolish virgins) 
as shut out, after undergoing such labours, after reining 



304 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

in incontinence, after running a course of rivalry with 
the celestial orders, after spurning the interests of the 
present life, after sustaining the scorching heat, rov 
Ko^vamct Tov /uiyoLv, after having leapt the bound (in the 
gymnasium) after having winged their way from earth 
to heaven, after they had not broken the seal of the body 
(a phrase of much significance) and obtained possession 
of the form of virginity (the eternal idea of divine purity) 
after having wrestled with angels, after trampling upon 
the imperative impulses of the body, after forgetting na- 
ture, after reaching, in the body, the perfections of the 
disimbodied state, after having won, and held, the vast 
and unconquerable possession of virginity, after all this, 
then they hear — Depart from me, I know you not! 

" Now you will not imagine that I make small account 
of virginity, great as it is. So great is it indeed, that 
none of the ancients were able to hold to it. For by the 
great grace (that has come to us) what was the most for- 
midable in the view of the prophets and the ancients, 
has become to us an easy matter, so that the things 
Avhich to them were the heaviest, and most extreme, 
namely, virginity, and the contempt of death, are now 
thought nothing of (as difficult,) even by mere girls. 
So difficult then was virginity esteemed, that none at- 
tempted to practise it. Noah, a just man, and one to 
whom God himself bore witness, nevertheless cohabited 
with a wife! as did also Abraham, and Isaac, the heirs 
of the promise. Joseph, that pattern of chastity, yet 
cohabited with a wife! A heavy thing indeed was the 
profession of virginity; nor until that time did virginity 
become efficacious, when the flower of virginity had 
blossomed (an allusion to our Lord's birth of a virgin) 
and so it was that none of the ancients (none living be* 



SCHEME OF SALVATIOX. 305 

fore the birth of Christ) were able to addict themselves 
to the ascetic practice of virginity. 

"A great matter indeed it is to rein the body. Paint 
to me now the figure of this virtue, and learn of what 
magnitude it is; seeing that it is waging a warfare which 
knows no truce, even for a day, a warfare w^orse than 
that with barbarians; for the contest we carry on with 
these have some interval, some truces; if now the sa- 
vage hordes assail us, now again they desist, and there 
is something of order, and an observance of seasons, ad- 
hered to. But the warfare of virginity hath no quiet, 
for the devil himself is the enemy, who regards no sea- 
sons of attack; nor ever waits while his adversary pre- 
pares for the assault; but stands every moment watching 
to find the virgin stripped, so that he may inflict upon her 
an opportune wound. Nay, so far from being permitted 
to rest, she carries her arch-enemy about with her. The 
condemned see their prince and judge, only at a season, 
and do not constantly endure the same torments; but the 
virgin, go whither she may, bears her avenger in her 
bosom, and supports her adversary in her arms, who al- 
lows her no repose, at eventide, or in the night, or in 
the dawn, or at noon; but still wages war, riS'oyhv iTroi-tB}}- 
/Aivoc, ya/xov /xnvvav ) SO as that an advantage may be gain- 
ed over her; g;t»ajgTflt; i<p' l}csi<rTng apctg TUg'^J'oviis « KO^^tvog (XdLK' 

QctKas vTrcKAiDfjLivn. Think then what the labour is which 
this course of life exacts! and yet, even those who have 
undergone all this, may hear the words — Depart from 
me, I never knew you! And see how great a virtue vir- 
ginity is, seeing that she hath for her sister — Almsgiving! 
having nothing that can ever be more arduous, but will be 
above all. Wherefore it was that these (foolish virgins) 
entered not in, because they had not, along with their 



306 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

virginity — almsgiving! — Thou hast then that 

efficacious mode of penance almsgiving, which is able to 
break the chains of thy sins; but thou hast also a way 
of penitence, more ready, by which thou mayest rid thy- 
self of thy sins.— Pray every hour!" 

These citations I would not curtail, inasmuch as they 
tell upon our argument in more ways than one. Let 
them, fraught as they are with the darkest errors of the 
darkest times of the churchy sink into the mind of every 
protestant who, while he is being cautioned against 
popery, is invited (inveigled might we not say) to accept 
the overcast Christianity of Chrysostom and his contem- 
poraries. The practical amount of the above cited pas- 
sages is this, and nothing better, that whoever could ap- 
pear at the gate of heaven with virginity in the one hand, 
and a sixpence of alms in the other, might boldly claim 
admission. When Chrysostom, drawing to a conclusion, 
after dwelling upon the hard-earned merits of celibacy, 
comes to say — Nevertheless all this merit may, at the last, 
avail its possessor nothing; one fully expects to hear 
him add — "unless it be accompanied with, and unless 
it spring from, a genuine and gracious principle of piety;" 
but such is not the doctrine of this prince of the Nicene 
church; — virginity, celestial virtue as it is, will not pur- 
chase heaven, apart from almsgiving. Heaven! what is 
its price? virginity and an obolus! The burden of sin, 
how is it to be got rid of? by virginity and an eleemosy- 
nary obolus! Let us now be plainly told whether pas- 
sages such as these, cited from this principal divine of 
the Nicene church, do really imbody, and fairly express 
the doctrine, and the general tenor of the articles and 
homilies of the English church. Was it to establish 
pharisaic delusions so gross as those which Chrysostom 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 307 

laboured to uphold, that the iUustrious victims of Mary's 
fury died in the flames at Oxford and in Smithfieid? 
The time must come when it will be felt, by all ingenu- 
ous minds, among the clergy, that, although the English 
church may have been allied to the Nicene, by the re- 
tention of a ^ew untoward phrases, in some of its of- 
fices, the heart and mind of the English reformers, and of 
the Nicene fathers, were totally dissimilar: the gospel, 
recovered for us by the one, had little or nothing in 
common with the dreaming theosophy of the other; ex- 
cept just the nomenclature of Christianity. The real 
question now at issue is — whether we shall go over to 
Chrysostom, Ambrose, and Basil; or stand fast by the 
English church and its founders. 

That the doctrine advanced by Chrysostom, in his ho- 
milies on repentance, was not a hasty rhetorical flourish, 
appears from its recurrence, in nearly the same terms, in 
his exposition of the gospel of Matthew (Horn. Ixxviii. 
torn. vii. p. 848,) and where he very distinctly aflirms that, 
vast as is the merit of virginity, it will not avail apart 
from almsgiving. We may, however, meet with doc- 
trine a little less grossly erroneous elsewhere among the 
INicene expositors: thus for instance Augustine, who, by 
the way, appears to be much less in favour with the 
Oxford divines than are his more popish predecessors 
and contemporaries, ofl'ers an explication of the same 
parable, which, making due allowance for the style of 
the times, may be admitted as rational and scriptural 
(see the Sermon on the Parable, and, De diversis quest. 
lix. and Enarratio in Psal. 147) notwithstanding the 
conceit about the five senses, as prefigured by the five 
virgins, and which had been adopted by several of the 
fathers. Jerome's exposition approaches, in some de* 



308 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

gree, thai of Augustine; and yet holds in part also to 
that of Chrysostom. Venditur hoc oleum, et multo emi- 
tur pretio, ac difficili labore conquiritur, quod m eleemo- 
synis cunctisque virtutibus et consiliis intelligimus ma- 
gistrorum. (Jerom. in loco.) Hilary (Comment, in 
Matt.) says that the lamps (flames) prefigure the " light 
of those resplendent souls that shine in the brightness 
of the sacrament of baptism: the oil is the fruit of good 
works: the vessels are the bodies of men, within which 
is hidden the treasure of a good conscience: those who 
sell this oil, are they who, needing the aid of the faith- 
ful, make this return, and by the supply of their neces- 
sities, furnish the buyers with what they seek. These 
(works ot charity) are the copious material of a flame 
that fails not. In ascending higher, we do not meet with 
notions much more evangelic. Origen (in loco) says — 
*' those who rightly believe and live, are properly com- 
pared to the five prudent; but those who, while profess- 
ing faith in Christ, have not prepared, themselves by 
good works for salvation, are likened to the ^v^ foolish 
virgins." 

Among those who occupy the foremost rank in the 
ancient church, and who are now, by name, held up as 
our masters in theology, there are shades of diflerence, 
and yet very nearly the same mind — a mind dimly illu- 
minated by the apostolic light, and from which the first 
principle of Christianity was almost wholly expelled by 
a substantially false notion of sanctity. There is, how- 
ever, solid satisfaction, in finding that, while men high 
in station were, with one consent, hotly driving the 
Christian world onwards toward the precipice into wliich 
llie Romish church plunged it headlong, there were 
iho?.e, in the shade, and of obscure name, who held to a 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 309 

better doctrine, and who, as we may well believe, dif- 
fused, unnoticed and unknown, a life-giving illumination 
of truth, within iheir narrow circles. Whoever may- 
have been the author of the Homilies and Apoplithegms, 
attributed to Macarius, the Egyptian — a hermit of the 
Nicene age, he evidently knew far more of Christianity, 
and more clearly perceived its real intention than any of 
the great orators and doctors of the same age. The re- 
cord of the true church is on high, and we may well 
believe that our Lord's promise to be with his church 
always, has received its accomplishment from age to 
age, in relation to thousands whose names make no 
figure in the patristic folios. 

Without alRrming more of the following passages 
than they seem to deserve, I think they may with ad- 
vantage be contrasted witli the quotation just above made 
from Chrysostom. " Behold the five virgins, prudent 
and vigilant, who, hastening to admit into the home of 
their nature — the vessel of their heart, the oil, that is to 
say, that grace of the Spirit which descends from above " 
(compare this with Chrysostom's virginity, lit up with 
a penny's worth of eleemosynary oil) '' were able to 
enter with the bridegroom into the heavenly marriage- 
feast. Whereas the foolish, abiding in their own natu- 
ral state, €v T« i^iA <pv7it ct7rofAuvsL<rctt did uot walch, nor took 
care to receive tlie oil of gladness into their ves^^els; but, 
just as they were in the flesh, slumbered through care- 
lessness, laxity, and indolence; or through ignorance, 
and a false notion of iheir own righteousness" (just such 
a notion as the language of the fathers above cited tended 
to foster) *' wherefore they were shut out from the royal 
banquet; not being such as could please the heavenly 
Bridegroom. For being held by the chain of mundane 
affections, and the love of things earthly, they had not 

27 



310 CONNEXION OF THE CELIBATE WITH THE 

rendered their entire hearts, in cordial attachment, to the 
heavenly Spouse, nor had received the unction; where- 
as souls seeking to entertain the divine guest, to wit, 
the sanctification of the Spirit, are bound by an undi- 
vided love to the Lord, and walk with him, converse 
with him by prayer, fix their thoughts upon him; from 
all else diverted, and so are deemed worthy to receive 
the oil of the heavenly grace, and thence are enabled to 
lead a life without offence, and altogether to please the 
spiritual Bridegroom." (Macarius, Horn, iv.) 

Much might be quoted from this same author, which, 
saving a phrase or two here and there, would pass as 
protectant and scriptural writing; and which offers al- 
most the strongest possible contrast to the manner and 
spirit of the great contemporary divines. It is particu- 
larly to be noted that this writer, although himself an as- 
cetic, a hermit, abstains from the favourite ascetic topics^ 
and often speaks in disparaging terms of celibacy, fast- 
ing, and the like. His style also, in regard to the sa- 
craments, differs essentially from that current in his 
times: in a word, he speaks of these means of grace in 
a manner befitting one who was spiritually taught. It 
is important to mark the latent alliances of doctrines, or 
that secret principle of affinity, which brings seeming- 
ly unconnected notions into actual conjunction. Thus, 
while the great Nicene writers, one and all, are seen to 
exclude the gospel, and to substitute a flimsy home-made 
justification, hammered out of celibacy, almsgiving, fast- 
ing, and all the frippery of the ascetic discipline, they 
are also heard to indulge in the wildest extravagances 
regarding the efficacy of the sacraments, the dignity of 
the sacerdotal office, the power of the church, and the 
like. They are also heard invoking the saints, adoring, 
or near to it, the relics of martyrs, and magnifying 



SCHEME OF SALVATION. 311 

whatever is formal and human, while they depress or 
forget whatever is spiritual and divine. 

The very reverse, in all these respects, is true of our 
obscure Macarius, who, taught from above, rises supe- 
rior, in great measure, to the delusions of the times he 
lived in, of which many striking instances might be ad- 
duced, and which would make conspicuous that misera- 
ble defection from evangelic principles which attaches 
to those of the Nicene fathers who are now being cited 
as authorities in theology. The contrast is made the 
more pointed, if we keep to the particular subject which 
we have found to be handled so poorly by Chrysostom, 
and others. 

" Unless humility, and simplicity, and goodness, 
adorn our tempers, a form of prayer will avail us no- 
thing; nor indeed any other labours w^e may undergo, 
in preserving virginity, or the like, . . . and, destitute of 
these graces, we shall take our part with the foolish vir- 
gins, in the day of judgment, who, because they had not 
in the vessels of their hearts the oil of spiritual grace, 
were named fools, and were excluded from the kingdom, 
by the spiritual Bridegroom." And elsewhere: — *' un- 
less humility, simplicity, love, cleave to us, our prayers, 
or, I should rather say, the semblance or pretence 
of prayer, will avail us nothing; and what is true of 
prayer, is true of other exercises of piety, even the most 
painful and laborious, such as virginity, vigils, fastings, 
psalmody, ministrations, and such like oHices of a spe- 
cious godliness,''^ (De custodia cordis.) 

We must not indeed expect to find in any writer of 
the Nicene age, not even in one who, like Macarius, 
gives evidence of rational and scriptural piety, a clear 
exhibition of what we emphatically call the gospel; for 
this had too long been k)st sight of, to be recovered in 



312 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

its fulness and power by any single mind. But there 
is, at the least — truth to a certain extent, as well as the 
absence of gross and fatal errors. Macarius may be 
read with pleasure and advantage, by those who are bet- 
ter taught than himself; wliile the principal Nicene fa- 
thers, whatever benefits we may receive from the peru- 
sal of them, are not to be looked into without distress, 
amazement, and the utmost caution. 

Some special Methods of estimating the Quality 

OF the Nicene Theology. 

There is a very simple method of ascertaining the 
tendency, and theological quality, of religious writings, 
which, although it may seem a little arbitrary, yet will, 
I think, very seldom prove to be fallacious: it turns upon 
the rule that a writer's selection of scripture, incidental, 
or formal, indicates his personal feeling, and his doctri- 
nal bias. This rule would at once be admitted, by many, 
as a safe one, if applied to some of our modern ultra 
protestant writers, who, while expounding, and quoting, 
a thousand times over, certain noted passages in Paul's 
epistles, are found to advert, much less often, to our 
Lord's discourses, and very sparingly adduce any of the 
merely preceptive portions of the very epistles, the doc- 
trinal parts of which engage so much of their attention. 
Why may we not then avail ourselves of this same rule, 
in other directions? It surely has a foundation in the 
reason of things, and it implies that, if at any time, or 
in any particular church, certain elements of truth have 
lost their due place in the system of doctrines, those 
passages of scripture where such elements are promi- 
nent, will be seldom adduced, or when adduced, will be 
confusedly and perversely expounded. 



QUALITY OF THE NICEXE THEOLOGY. 313 

Now, nothing can be more striking than is the result 
of a general survey of the patristic literature, as brought 
to the criterion of this special rule. The question be- 
inor — Did the Nicene divines themselves understand, and 
preach, the gospel? Look to their choice of scripture — 
the list of texts, most in favour with them. The gene- 
ral reader should be apprized that, in almost all the edi- 
tions of the fathers, there is found, besides a general in- 
dex, rerum memorabilium, an index also of the passages 
of scripture which the author expounds, or v/hich lie in- 
cidentally cites. By the aid then of these indices, a 
pretty exact idea may, without much labour, be obtained, 
of the feeling and doctrinal tendency of these iheolo- 
logians, on the ground of the rule above advanced. It 
will not be imagined that the absolute completeness or 
correctness of these indices should be vouched for; 
nevertheless, their general accuracy may very safely be 
affirmed; nor do I believe that the issue of such an ex- 
amination would be at all affected by tlie few instances 
of omission, which a diligent research might perhaps 
discover. 

Assuming, then, these tables of texts cited or ex- 
pounded, to be, in the main, correct, we shall find, in 
the first place, that, with a remarkable uniformity, they 
offer to the eye those half dozen texts which afford a 
colour of authority to the principles and practices of the 
ascetic institute. Few indeed omit a reference to our 
Lord's words — Let him that is able to receive it, &;c., or, 
They neither marry nor are given in marriage, &c., or, 
to Paul's — It is good for a man not to touch a woman, &c. 
These tables exhibit also, and of this we do not com- 
plain, an abundant gleaning, nay a rich harvest, gathered 
from the preceptive portions of the inspired volume: 

27* 



314 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

generally, more from the Old Testament, than from the 
New, and more from the gospels, than from the epis- 
tles, and more from the didactic than from the doctrinal 
parts of the epistles. 

But those noted passages which, to protestant ears 
are the most familiar, and to the well taught and spiritu- 
ally minded, are the most dear, such bright passages 
are, in some of these lists, altogether wanting, and in 
most are the least frequently cited; or where cited, it is 
in a sense, or for a purpose, very unlike (as we must 
think) their true intention. There are certain passages 
which, setting forth in the clearest manner, the freeness, 
the largeness, and the sufficiency of the method of sal- 
vation, are the first to convey hope and joy to contrite 
spirits; and they are the very same which the most emi- 
nent (modern) Christians — -the most laborious, and the 
most holy, have clung to in their last hours: they are 
the passages, moreover, which the most efficient and 
enlightened preachers and pastors have employed as the 
key-note of their ministrations, public and private; and 
the very same are what may be called the hinges of con- 
troversy, between the first reformers and their purblind 
antagonists of the Romish church. 

Now I would earnestly recommend those who are 
conscientiously determined to satisfy themselves, by 
personal researches, concernint]f the great question now 
at issue, between the Nicene fathers, and the reformers, 
to pursue the suggestion I am liere ofiering, and to as- 
certain (no very difiicult task) whether the allegation be 
true or not — That the great divines of antiquity either 
avoid all reference to passages of the kind now spoken 
of; or cite them in some incidental manner, and apart 
from any expression of their own feelings; or, if they 
quote and expound such passages, do it in a perverted 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 318 

Planner, and so as to make it certain that they themselves 
discerned little or nothing of the glory of Christianity, 
as therein expressed. This strange forgetfulness of 
what, on every account, claims our constant regard, and 
which, in modern times, has^ on all sides (among those 
who have seriously addicted themselves to the study of 
the scriptures) received the most attention, forces itself 
upon our notice, whenever we open the remains of an- 
cient Christianity. Every thing is wrought up and ex- 
panded, and repeated, and expounded — every thing, but 
the gospel itself! From the apostolic fathers, and Jus- 
tin, down to Gregory I. and Boethlus, nearly the same 
dimness in this respect attaches to all. 

I am anxious to suggest to those who will avail them- 
selves of such aid, various and independent modes of 
bringing to the proof, the patristic theology, on this most 
serious allegation, of its sad deficiency in evangelic feel- 
ing, as well as doctrine. Among these methods, I have 
already mentioned, as peculiarly conclusive, an exami- 
nation of those portraits of Christianity, in the concrete, 
with which the works of the fathers abound. To this 
criterion, let it be objected that the false rhetorical taste 
of the limes may perhaps have hidden from us, in such 
instances, ilie simple evangelic element, of which we 
are in search, and which actually attached, as well to 
the orator as to the subject of his too flowery declama- 
tion. Be it so; but is it not a rule in historical science, 
that, though men may often, after their death, be painted 
in false colours, by their admiring friends, they will be 
found to have truly painted themselves, in their letters 
to their intimate associates? 

Now if this rule be a good one, I fear its application 
to the Nicene divines will exhibit them in no very ad- 
vantageous light, personally, as Christian men. That 



316 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

they were, most of them, sincere, devout, assiduous in 
their duties, and anxiously intent upon the welfare of 
the churches under their care, is incontestably proved 
by these remains. But does it appear from the same 
documents, that their hearts were warmed by those 
truths which are the glory of the Christian system, and 
which, when so entertained, impart an unction, and an 
animation to Christian communion? I think the affir- 
mative cannot be pretended in favour of these divines, by 
even their most devoted admirers. What can be more 
dead and trivial than a large proportion of the epistolary 
remains of the ancient church? I will not name the 
epistles of Synesius, or those of Gregory Nazianzen; 
but what are those even of Basil, or Ambrose, or Chry- 
sostom? If these specimens of ancient Christian friend- 
ship are found, generally, to breathe a simple-hearted 
evangelic piety, or to glow with an apostolic zeal for 
the fartherance of a pure gospel, then let it be acknow- 
ledged that whatever unfavourable inferences may seem 
to have resulted from a perusal of other portions of the 
early Christian literature, we have been mistaken in the 
estimate we have formed of the men and of the system. 
Are the advocates of Nicene Christianity willing to 
abide by the result of a full examination of the extant 
patristic epistles? I suppose not; and yet it does not 
appear why the criterion should not be regarded as a 
fair and conclusive one. Putting out of view, for a mo- 
ment, their inspiration, we think ourselves able, in read- 
ing the apostolic epistles, to say what subjects were 
uppermost in the minds of the writers; nor can proles- 
tani readers of the Bible find themselves at a loss in de- 
termining, from these documents, whether the religion 
of the writers was a system of fear, servility, bodily 
eervice, ascetic virtue, credulity, exa^^geration, sacra- 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 317 

mental mystification, and ecclesiastical arrogance; or a 
system of warmth, affection, hope, joy, love, substan- 
tial virtue, and real holiness. Now, judging of the 
Nicene writers precisely in the same way, that is to 
say, by the general tenor and apparent temper of their 
letters to the churches, or to their individual friends, is 
there any one bold enough to affirm that the former, not 
the latter, are the characteristics of these remains, and to 
invite ample citations, in support of so perilous a chal- 
lenge? I can only mention these methods of proof, and 
express the hope that the conscientious inquirer will 
avail himself of them. 

There is, however, another criterion, which might 
with advantage be appealed to. What I mean is an ex- 
amination of the subjects selected by the Nicene writers, 
as their favourite themes; or as those w^hich they thought 
themselves the most imperatively called upon to treat. 
Now, the religious literature of any age may be loosely 
classified, as consisting of — Expositions of scripture, 
whether consecutive or incidental — Polemic treatises on 
the points in controversy at that time — Free, or as we 
may say, spontaneous disquisitions, whether in the ho- 
miletic form, or otherwise, upon the chief subjects of 
practical piety, and of Christian morals — Treatises, 
mainly philosophical, or critical, yet bearing upon theo- 
logy; — and lastly, though not of least account, Compo- 
sitions bearing upon ecclesiastical order, ritual, and the 
actual government or welfare of particular churches. In 
taking a glance, then, at the contents of the seventy or 
eighty folios which comprise the choice of the Nicene 
theology, we might dismiss, as not so pertinent to our 
immediate object, two of the above-named classes, name- 
ly, the Polemical, and the Philosophical, and examine 
the remaining three. In the present instance, however, 



318 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

I can only offer a remark upon the first, namely, the 
ancient expositions — a subject indeed so wide and va- 
rious, that it would be absurd to make a cursory allusion 
to it, except in reference to particular and well-defined 
points. A limited reference then, of this sort, I will 
proceed to make. 

In looking broadly at the ancient expositions of Scrip- 
ture, the weil-known, and prominent characteristic of 
many of them, namely, the mythic, or allegorizing inter- 
pretation of its plain histories, and simple statements of 
fact, has a meaning which, I think, has been too little 
adverted to. This propensity to mystify the plainest 
things, may be, and has been, attributed to the opera- 
tion of several independent causes; but there is one 
which, although the less obvious, was, as I am persuaded, 
the principal and the most constant. If Origen be 
named (whether justly or not) as the author of this alle- 
gorizing method, he will aid us, as we shall see, in 
tracing it up to its secret source — that same gnostic 
feeling, which explains so many other characteristics of 
ancient Christianity. A reference to two or three places 
in this learned, amiable, and pious writer, will exclude 
any doubt as to the fact, that the Christian church, par- 
ticipating with the gnostics, in those sickly and oriental 
notions of the divine nature, which led the latter, as 
heretics, to attribute the visible creation to an inferior 
and imperfect being, and to regard the Jewish history, 
and economy, as unworthy of the supreme goodness and 
wisdom, this deep gnostic feeling impelled the Chris- 
tian expositors to rid themselves, as far as miglit be, of 
difficulties so formidable, first, and where it could be 
done, by roundly affirming that certain narrations, in the 
Old Testament, are not histories of facts, but pure alle- 
gories, or mythic inventions, conveying spiritual truths; 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 319 

secondly, where this bold hypothesis was altogether in- 
admissible, or where its adoption was not hazarded, by 
merely diverting the attention from the plain history, in 
the copious use of ingenious accommodations; that is to 
say, allegories appended to the history, where the his- 
tory could not be absolutely melted down into fable. So 
much for the mode of interpreting scripture, in avoid- 
ance of gnostic objections. But there remained a rather 
more difficult task, imposed by the same gnostic senti- 
mentality, which was that of reconciling the gnostic no- 
tion of the divine nature, as pure and wise, with the 
constitution of the animal creation. Now, this task was 
connected with the interpretation of scripture, by the 
means of allegorizing disquisitions upon the Mosaic ac- 
count of the six days' work. It was not indeed that the 
lion, the tiger, the crocodile, the adder, the vulture, the 
shark, could be spoken of as other than they are; but 
yet, while a thousand gay conceits concerning the *« spi- 
ritual meaning," couched under these untoward natures, 
could be held before the mind, something was done, and 
a respite was obtained from the tormenting pressure of 
the theosophic conception of the Deity. 

Ample, and really amusing illustrations of what I am 
now affirming, may be met with by referring to the 
Hexaemeron of Ambrose; where the forms, qualities, 
habits, of fishes, reptiles, birds, and beasts, are con- 
vincingly shown to adumbrate all points of theology and 
morals. And to what lengths did this irresistible infatu- 
ation carry so respectable a writer? To what use, for 
instance, does he dare to convert the (misunderstood) na- 
tural history of the vulture? Let the reader look to the 
twentieth chapter of the fifth book, and amidst his 
amazement and disgust, acknowledge the proof he there, 
and elsewhere, finds, of the presence of a motive, pow- 



320 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

erful enough to overthrow all soundness of judgment, 
and to violate all religious decorum. Nonne advertimus 
quod Dominus ex ipsa natura plurlma exemj)la ante prae- 
misit, quibus susceptae incarnationis decorem probaret, 
et adstrueret veritatem. Basil makes the same oifensive 
use of the same ridiculous fable; and throughout his 
Hexaemeron employs a rich invention in what he, and 
others, considered as the laudable endeavour, not so 
much to derive lessons of piety from the natural world, 
as to obviate, or supersede, the terrible gnostic objection 
to the mundane system, as impure and sanguinary. But 
we must return for a moment to the mythic interpreta- 
tion of the Old Testament history, and see in what way 
Origen opens up to us the real motive of this practice. 

The principle of allegorical interpretation which he 
adopted, is staled and defended, as well incidentally as 
formally, in many parts of his writings, and, among the 
reasons adduced in behalf of it is this, that it aids us in un- 
derstanding passages which, if literally interpreted, would 
either involve contradictions, or be offensive, and tend 
to encourage sentiments and practices elsewhere explicit- 
ly condemned (see the Fragment on Gaiaiians, lorn. i. p. 
43, Benedictine, and more at length, in the De Principiis, 
lib. iv.) He formally assumes a license for considering 
as allegory, whatever, even in the plainest narrations, 
does not seem to consist with certain received notions of 
what was fitting in the divine dispensations, or in the 
conduct of the patriarchs. That tiiis principle of inter- 
pretation sprung, not merely from the wish to obviate 
gnostic objections, but from a latent admission of their 
force, appears clearly enough from the tenor of the fol- 
lowing passage; especially when compared with the 
places in which the rule of allegorical exposition is ac- 
tually applied to particular instances. Origen, having 



QUALITY OF THE NfCENE THEOLOGY. 321 

established the inspiration of the scriptures, states the 
necessity of laying down such a rule of interpretation, 
as shall exclude the cavils and false assumptions of Jews 
and heretics. 

" These latter, when they read such texts as these — a 
fire is kindled by my wrath," &c. . . . and a thousand 
things of the like kind, have not indeed dared to deny 
that these scriptures are from a God; but then they sup- 
pose ihern to have proceeded from the demiurge, whom 
the Jews worship, an imperfect, and not benevolent be- 
ing; and they affirm that the Saviour has come to an- 
nounce to mankind a more perfect Deity, whom they 
deny to be the same as the demiurge, or creator of this 
world. Having once strayed from the truth, they have 
adopted various opinions, at the suggestion of their fancy, 
and have adopted notions concerning the visible and the 
invisible worlds, as attributable to different creators. 
There are moreover, even within the pale of the church, 
some of the simpler sort, and who mainly hold to the true 
theology, and who yet (in consequence of their adhe- 
rence to the literal sense of scripture) think of the true 

God in the most unworthy manner Now the sole 

cause of all the errors above referred to, whether of the 
impious, or of the simple-minded, is the habit of under- 
standing scripture not in the spiritual (or mystic) but in 
the naked and literal sense." Our author then proceeds, 
at great length, to expound and to recommend his own 
remedial system of interpretation; which, as he thinks, 
will enable us to evade every difficulty, and to preserve, 
unimpaired, those just and elevated notions of the divine 
purity, justice, and benevolence, which the gospel con- 
veys. 

It is manifest then, and other passages might be cited 

to the same effect, that, with Origen, who was the au- 

28 



322 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

thor, or great promoter of the mythic mode of interpre- 
tation, the primary motive for its adoption was a tacit ad- 
mission of the gnostic sentiment and doctrine. This 
system of exegesis, violent as it was, and shocking to 
common sense, and precarious too, for it could not be 
applied to ail cases, even to those the most needing it, 
has often, by modern writers, been attributed merely to 
" a false taste," or to an '* ambition of ingenuity," or 
to an oriental exuberance of the imagination. But we see 
that it had a deeper and a more serious meaning, and 
that it is the indication of what I have called a gnostic 
feeling, strong in the minds even of those who were the 
most decisive opponents of the gnostic heresies. The 
broad expression of this same feeling we have found un- 
der another form — the doctrine and practice of abstrac- 
tive asceticism and celibacy, and have thus obtained in- 
cidental, and yet conclusive proof of the oneness and 
consistency of that system which, in the Nicene age, 
had come into the place of apostolic Christianity. 

I wish especially, on this occasion, to point out the 
slightness and fallacy of the mode in which modern wri- 
ters have allowed themselves to allude, with an incu- 
rious and affected scorn, to the characteristic features of 
ancient Christianity. "Monkery and asceticism" — 
they w^ere the *' follies of the age;" — " superstitious no- 
tions and practices;" — the human mi»d liad then " be- 
come enfeebled;" — "the mystic interpretation of scrip- 
ture" — " the fathers were men of more imagination than 
judgment;" and, in a word, " we, better taught as we 
are, may just glance at these errors, and pass on." 
This frivolous style, unsatisfactory and unphilosophical 
as it is, might have passed as sufficient in the times that 
are gone, or that are going by; but it is now becoming not 
simply obsolete and inappropriate, but seriously delusive 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 323 

and dangerous; inasmuch as it favours the supposition 
that ancient Christianity, although disfigured by some 
blemishes, was yet, as compared with the Romanism of 
later times, pure and sound. 

A more exact, and I must needs say, a more philoso- 
phical analysis of the ancient church system, will, as I 
am fully persu-aded, serve to convince all unprejudiced 
minds that these trivial imperfections, or "follies," as 
we have been taught to call them, were, in truth, the 
several symptoms of one and the same deep-seated dis- 
ease; and that, for instance, things so seemingly uncon- 
nected and independent as we may think the profession 
of virginity, and the mythic interpretation of scripture, 
both sprang, in no circuitous manner, from one princi- 
ple, and that principle nothing else but the rudiment of 
the Asiatic theosophy. But then, this same sovereign 
cause gave law to every thing else, or to every thing 
which distinguishes the Nicene, from the apostolic 
church. Hence the danger of borrowing notions, rites, 
and practices, from a system v/hich had come under the 
tyrannous control of a foreign and fatal influence. 

But there are peculiarities attaching to the ancient mode 
of expounding scripture which demand to be noticed as 
illustrating our present position, that the great Nicene 
writers were, in a very low degree, conscious of those 
truths which protestants regard as constituting the glory 
and peculiarity of the gospel. 

I have already mentioned that omission of the most 
vividly evangelic portions of scripture, which appears 
when we examine the indices of texts cited by the fa- 
thers. But when we open what professes to be a con- 
secutive exposition of an epistle fraught with the most 
animating passages, we feel as if, now at least, we must 
discover what was the feeling of the writers; for how 



324: MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

can they avoid what stands directly in their path, and in a 
path chosen by themselves? How avoid such evangelic 
passages? Sometimes by neatly leaping over them! Of 
which several instances may be found in Chrysostom's 
expositions of the Pauline epistles. These serious la- 
cunae in certain noted ancient expositions, would, if the 
continuity of the discourse did not preclude the sup- 
position, make one think that a leaf, here and there, had 
been torn from the manuscript. But, if passages of the 
kind now referred to are not actually passed over, they 
are too often expounded in a style that is dry and cold, 
or ambiguous, or positively erroneous. 

In support of this representation I must confine myself 
to one or two instances, but they will be such as to carry 
the inference appended to them. Chrysostom's mode of 
exposition is characterised by its dilfuseness, and pro- 
lixity; and we may say, in a sense, its comprehensive- 
ness. He stands, moreover, by general suffrage, at the 
head of the Nicene divines, and is surely second to 
none of them as an expositor — all qualities taken toge- 
ther. We may safely, therefore, bring him forward as an 
authoritative instance. 

The seventh homily on the Epistle to the Romans 
contains a diffuse exposition of the latter portion of the 
third chapter; and it is such as would, probably, sa- 
tisfy many modern readers, clearly affirming as it does, 
that salvation is God's free gift; a gift received by faith, 
and not to be obtained by the observance of the Jewish 
law. So far all is well; and one is happy, too, to meet 
with so much of truth; but yet no such distinction is 
observed as warrants our supposing that Chrysostom 
had, in his mind, the important difference between the 
" making just,^^ and the justifying, or declaring just, 
in a forensic sense; nor does he kindle upon the theme, 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 325 

nor take the occasion to awaken the hearts of his hearers, 
as a modern preacher would not fail to do; but he slides 
off immediately into ethical disquisitions, which, pro- 
per as they may be in themselves, yet, in the connexion 
in which they come, must have tended to cherish, rather 
the legal, than the evangelic feeling of those whom he 
addressed. The phrase g|ct;<?)vii? «f/xa/o«? ^o/g//, might sug- 
gest the belief, that, justification by faith, in the protes- 
tant sense, was intended; but wlien we turn to the 
places where the same writer declares his opinion of the 
justifying efficacy of baptism, it becomes but too evi- 
dent, that such an expression, and much besides, which 
might by itself seem unexceptionable, really meant a far 
different doctrine; how different, let those say who have 
read and considered the two exhortations addressed to 
the candidates for baptism. (See especially the passage, 
tom. i. p. 269.) " Although a man should be foul w^ilh 
every vice, the blackest that can be named, yet, should 
he fall into the baptismal pool, he ascends from the di- 
vine waters, purer than the beams of noon." This, 
then, was Chrysostom's sense of the ''making just in a 
moment." In truth, this is placed beyond doubt by 
what soon follows — " They who approach the baptismal 
font, although fornicators, &:c., are not only made clean, 
but holy also, and just, etyiovg Kctt Suaiovc. 

Nothing is more necessary, in looking into the fathers, 
than to be guarded against the illusion of attributing an 
evangelic sense to phrases and passages which can be so 
understood only so long as we attribute to them a mo- 
dern sense; but which, v/hen collated with other pas- 
sages in the same writer, are found to have borne, in the 
mind of the ancient church, a meaning totally different; 
and, as we must think, a meaning miserably erroneous. 

Let us not then be referred to Chrysostom's exposition 

28* 



325 MEANS OF ESTlMATtNa THE 

of the Epistle to the Romans, in proof of the substan- 
tial soundness of his opinions, until there be adduced 
also passages, such as tlie one now cited, where, what- 
ever a protestant might wish to say of justificalion by 
faith, and of salvation by grace without works, is at- 
tached to the baptismal rite, as its constant and proper 
effect. Nothing would be easier than, by an artfully se- 
lected series of quotations, to make Chrysostom preach 
like Luther, or even Calvin; but let Chrysostom be al- 
lowed to expound Chrysostom, and then the illusion is 
dispelled. " As a spark thrown into the ocean, is in- 
stantly extinguished, so is sin, be it what it may, extin- 
guished when the man is thrown into the laver of rege- 
neration." Nay, he comes forth another man. That 
the highest possible importance was attached to the 
mere rite^ appears from the way in which it is every 
where spoken of, and particularly when the preacher is 
reprehending those — too many, who deferred baptism to 
their last hour, and who, irrespectively of their state of 
mind, or moral condition, are solemnly declared to be 
liable, until so regenerated, to eternal torments. But 
this is a subject too weighty to be cursorily treated, and 
which will demand hereafter the fullest explication. 
The instance may be enough to illustrate my mean- 
ing, in saying that, what may seem the most evangelic 
and unexceptionable in the patristic expositions, must al- 
ways be held as worth only what it will appear to mean, 
after the author's sense of the phrases he employs has 
been ascertained from himself; and has been entirely 
disengaged from our protestant modes of thinking. 

What were Chrysostom's candidates for baptism likely 
to be thinking of, supposing them to have been sincere 
and devout? Was it the grace and power of the divine 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 327 

Saviour, in whom, if they were at that time fit subjects 
for the rile, ihey had already believed, or was it the ab- 
stract doctrine of justification by faith, or indeed any 
doctrine, or any state of mind, truly called spiriliial? It 
"inigfit have been so; but the direct tendency of the 
preacher's very solemn discourse, on this occasion, was 
(the human mind being such as it is) to make them think 
intently, and almost exclusively, of the rite of baptism — 
the " pool of regeneration and justification," a descent 
into which was the turning point of salvation — the wicket, 
in passing through which the man made his way in a 
moment, from the confines of the pit of eternal misery, 
and set foot upon the terra firma of eternal life: — this 
pool, hiding beneath its spavkling surface the most tre- 
mendous mysteries, was almost certain to fix the eyes 
of the trembling candidate, in the previous moment a 
child of wrath, unregenerate, unjustified, and, should any 
accident intervene, unsaved. To such a one, nay, to 
far the larger proportion of all who approached the awful 
brink of those wonder-working waters, the rite took the 
place of the spiritual reality, and of the Saviour. 

This point, although it lead us a little from our direct 
path, we must insist upon a moment. In considering, 
practically, the effect of different modes of presenting re- 
ligious truths to the mass of minds, the question is not, 
whether such and such great principles, acknowledged 
to be momentous, are sometimes offered to the view of 
the people; but rather this, whether they are so offered 
as that the several elements of religion are seen in their 
true perspective — the foremost, foremost; the hindermost, 
hindermost? Every thing depends upon this perspective, 
even all the vast difference between a saving gospel, and a 
pernicious delusion. And in considering such a question, 



328 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

in a practical manner, we must take into the account, 
not the nice and well-compacted notions of a few cul- 
tured minds, well trained in analysis, and synthesis, 
and order; but must have regard to the thousand, the 
many, who, purely, passive as to whatever is intellec- 
tual, will accept things, just as they are offered to them. 
It is precisely on this ground of practical wisdom, that 
we (protestants) are used utterly to reject the fine papis- 
tical apologies that have been offered for image \vorship, 
and the supplication of the saints. Tell us not how the 
few may possibly steer clear of fatal errors, and avoid a 
gross idolatry, v^^hile admitting such practices. What 
will be their effect with the multitude? The actual con- 
dition of the mass of the people in all countries where 
popery has been unchecked, gives us a sufficient answer 
to this question; nor do w^e scruple to condemn these 
practices as abominable idolatries. Tell us not how 
Fenelon, or Pascal, might extricate themselves from this 
impiety: what are the frequenters of churches in Na- 
ples, and Madrid? nothing better than the grossest poly- 
theists, and far less rationally religious, than were their 
ancestors of the times of Numa and Pythagoras. 

When the eye opens upon a wide and splendid pros- 
pect, idly gazing upon it, all its parts are depicted on 
the retina, as well as present to the mind. Say, how- 
ever, to the listless spectator — " If you keep your eye 
fixed upon yonder obscure cottage, you will presently 
see the greatest monarch on earth issue from it," and 
the effect would be instantly, that, although the same 
width of landscape was still before the organ — the same 
fields, groves, rivers, mountains, palaces, painted on the 
retina; yet nothing would be present to the mind, nothing 
but this cottage. 'J'he law of intellectual vision is pre- 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 329 

cisely analogous to this. It means nothing to say, 
'*such and such important objects have been placed 
within the view of those whom we instruct:" — upon 
wliich, among these objects, has the mind been concen- 
trated? All else is nearly as if it were not. And it is, 
moreover, to be remembered, that, according to the in- 
variable laws of the human mind, while the power to take 
a comprehensive and just view of various objects, lying 
together within the field of vision, belongs to the calmest 
minds only; and, in their several degrees, to every mind 
in its calmest moments, the exdusiveness of the mind's 
regard to single objects, is always directly as the amount 
of emotion at the time. Agitate the soul, in any way, 
excite its fears, hopes, or any of the passions, and then 
instandy, and just in proportion to the excitement, will 
the mind lose its consciousness of all but the single ex- 
citing object. Show a man the muzzle of a loaded can- 
non, peeping from a thicket, in the distance, and whence 
he may every moment expect his death; show him, on 
the broad bosom of a tumbling sea, an open boat, in 
which his wife and children are tossing, between hope 
and despair, and what else will he see! 

Now this law of our nature, a law taking sovereign 
hold of the mass of mankind; indeed of all but a very 
few, has a most important bearing upon the style and 
topics of popular religious instruction. You may disre- 
gard, if you will, the due perspective of objects \vhen 
you are coldly lect'uring upon philosophy; but to fall 
into this error of position and proportion, v;hen the stir- 
ring motives of eternity, when the alternatives of heaven 
and hell, are quickening the most intense emotions, and 
stimulating the most vivid anxieties, to do so, in such in- 
stances, is the same thing as to teach, in a positive form, 
the blackest heresies: no heresy can be really more fatal 



330 MEANS OF ESTIMATIXG THE 

than is the practical error of presenthig the objects of re- 
ligious regard in an inverted order, to a mind deeply 
moved by religious sentiments. It is cruel mockery, in 
such a case to say — " nay, we set forth all the truth." 
On what point was the anxious eye fixed? 

Now I am persuaded that the merits of the general 
system of popular teaching as practised by the ancient 
church, as well as the soundness of what are now termed 
"church doctrines," if judged of according to this rule 
— a rule founded upon the first principles of human na- 
ture, may readily be determined; and the result of ap- 
plying such a criterion will be to reject, as far worse 
than positive heresy, that practical dislocation of objects 
which was the characteristic of ancient Christianity, and 
which is the characteristic of the Oxford Tract '* church 
doctrines." Let us apply this criterion for a moment, 
and in doing so, take the ground, and admit the premises, 
of the Oxford Tract writers. 

In one of the most ingenious, specious, candid, and 
attractive of these publications, (No. 85,) perhaps the 
most so, after that on '* Reserve in communicating reli- 
gious knowledge," the difficulties under which ''church 
principles " labour, as resting upon very slender and in- 
direct proofs, are fully and fairly stated — stated, and (let 
it be granted) mitigated, if not removed; nay, I would al- 
low, so far removed, or the pressure of them so far re- 
lieved, as to prevent their being fatal to those doctrines 
—other considerations which weigh against them, not 
now admitted. It is granted by the writer, that these 
doctrines, such as the divine right of episcopacy, the 
apostolic succession, the power of the church, the effi- 
cacy of the sacraments, the sacrificial virtue of the Lord's 
supper, and so forth, are wanting in direct or satisfacto- 
ry proof, and are to be established, if at all, only by the 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 331 

aid of very attenuated, and nicely managed inferential 
arguments. " Every one must allow," says the writer, 
speaking in the person of an objector, " that there is 
next to nothing, on the surface of scripture, about them 
(these church doctrines) and very little, even under the 
surface, of a satisfactory character." — '* In short, is not, 
it may be asked, the state of the evidence for all these 
doctrines just this — a few striking texts, at most, scat- 
tered up and down the inspired volume; or one or two 
particular passages, of one particular epistle, or a num- 
ber of texts, which may mean, but need not mean, what 
they are said by churchmen to mean, which say some- 
thing looking like what is needed, but with very little 
strength and point, inadequately and unsatisfactorily?" 
And again, the same objection is otherwise stated. — 
*'Now, when we turn to scripture, we see much indeed 
of those gifts (spiritual) we read much of what Christ 
has done /or us, by atoning for our sins, and much of 
what he does in us, that is, much about holiness, faith, 
peace, love, joy, hope, and obedience; but of those in- 
termediate portions of the revelation, coming between 
him and us, of which the church speaks, we read very 
little." — p. 50. 

After having thus, and more at length, admitted the dif- 
ficulty, the writer goes on, with much address, and let it 
be confessed, with some solid reason, so far, to show that, 
although so slenderly attested, and so slightly alluded 
to in scripture, these doctrines inay nevertheless, like 
other principles, universally received among orthodox 
Christians, have actually constituted a part, and even an 
essential part, of apostolic Christianity, and that, whe- 
ther we find them in scripture, or elsewhere, they may 
reasonably claim our reverential regard. 

Let all this conditional reasoning, and the ingenious 



332 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

illustrations attending it, be admitted as satisfactory, and 
let it (for a moment) be granted that the opinions of the 
Oxford Tract writers concerning "Baptism, the Lord's 
Supper, Church Union, Ministerial Power, Apostolical 
Succession, Absolution, and other rites and ceremonies," 
are sound; that is to say, that these doctrines and prac- 
tices are either somewhere contained in, or are virtually 
conveyed by, the New Testament, although not thence 
to be gathered by any convincing method of proof; or, 
that they may be gathered from history. Be it so; that 
is to say, that, while the apostles insist upon faith, hope, 
love, joy, peace, obedience, and the like, they also taught 
and established, in the churches, the " church principles 
and practices," such as we find them every where in the 
records of ancient Christianity. 

For reasons which may lie beyond our ken, it may 
have pleased God to convey the spiritual and moral ele- 
ments of religion through the medium of explicit written 
statements; while the ritual and ecclesiastical elements 
of the same great and harmonious scheme were to reach 
us more circuitously, or more ambiguously. If this were 
granted to be the fact, (which is much more than we 
grant,) yet could we go on to believe that the relative 
position, or, as we may say, the perspective of objects, — 
the spiritual, the moral, the ritual, the ecclesiastical, — 
was, with the divine sanction, and in accordance with 
the divine will, to be distorted, or inverted, when the 
apostolic scheme came into the hands of the next gene- 
ration? Grant it, that more belonged to apostolic Chris- 
tianity than may certainly or clearly be gathered from 
the apostolic writings; but yet, was not this after-portion 
to fall into its place, in obedience to the general law 
of the system, as we may gather that law from the style, 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 333 

temper, and very words, and special decisions, of the 
apostles? Was it intended that the individual Christian 
vi^as, as soon as the apostles left the world, to shift his 
position, and to betake himself to a point of view whence 
every thing, spiritual, moral, ritual, and ecclesiastical, 
would appear under a totally different aspect, and present 
to the eye a side that had not been seen before; and that 
those objects, severally, should subtend, on the field of 
vision, exchanged magnitudes — the great seeming small, 
and the small great? Is this to be believed? 

But it must be believed, if we are to take the several 
articles of what is called " chnrch doctrin<3 " in the order, 
and under the perspective, in which we find them, where 
only we do find them at all, namely, in the extant remains 
of the early church. If we give up these records, we 
give up those superadded practices and principles, of 
'* church doctrines;" for we have no other sufficient war- 
rant for paying them any regard. But, if we adhere to 
these records, then on what principle do we submit to 
the rites and notions thence derived, as of apostolic au- 
thority, and yet reject the relative position therein as- 
signed to them? Whence do we draw our autliority for 
making this distinction, and for acting upon the differ- 
ence, between the doctrines or practices themselves, and 
the location of thetn? If the bishops of the early church 
are to teach us " the way of the Lord more perfectly '^ 
than we can learn it from the apostles themselves, then, 
on what ground do we call in question their right to hold 
the entire scheme of religion up to our view, in its just 
perspective? I do not understand how we can yield 
ourselves to this extra-apostolic authority, just in regard 
to the articles of Christian belief and worship; and tiien 
withdraw ourselves from it, in regard to the oilier in 
which they are to follow one the other. 

29 



334 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

I assume it, then, as certain, that, in taking what are 
called the '* church doctrines" from the early and Nicene 
church writers, we are bound to receive them not insu- 
lated, or in fragments; but as we there Jind them. But, 
if so, then we, that is to say, those who yield themselves 
to this guidance, are placed in a predicament as serious 
as any that can be imagined, for we are not merely called 
upon to accept, as of divine authority, very much which 
the inspired writers barely glance at; but to regard those 
things as foremost which, in the inspired writings, even 
if they appear at all, and which is confessed to be 
doubtful, are placed hindermost. To make so many 
additions to our faith, worship, and practice, is some- 
thing; but it yet is nothing compared with the ominous 
operation of inverting the entire order of things — spiri- 
tual, moral, ritual, and ecclesiastical. What religious 
mind will not hesitate and tremble when invited to go 
to such a length as this? 

No fact in the history of religion, or philosophy, ob- 
trudes itself more forcibly, or more frequently, upon our 
notice, than that of the utter contrast between the apos- 
tolic writings and the writings of the fathers, especially 
of the Nicene fathers, (who are now to be our masters,) 
in this particular, namely, the relative position of the 
diverse elements of religion. I can hardly believe that 
any will be so bold as roundly to deny, or as in any im- 
portant sense to qualify, the statement of this fact. As- 
suredly none: not the Oxford Tract writers, for they 
have confessed the very contrary; none will dare to say 
that the apostles were mainly intent upon the enhance- 
ment and glorification of the rites, forms, dignities, and 
exterior apparatus of Christianity. If any will say this, 
I have no reply to make to them. Nor can I suppose 
that any, except a very few, who, by long and fond con- 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 335 

verse with antiquity, have lost the vigour of their moral 
and intellectual perceptions, will deny that the fathers, 
and the Nicene fathers especially, look at the compo- 
nents of their Christianity from an opposite point. They 
do not, as I have stated twenty times, deny, or altogether 
forget, that which is spiritual in religion; but they place 
foremost, and they urgently direct, the minds of the 
people towards that which is visible, ritual, and ecclesi- 
astical. It is on these matters that their seriousness and 
fervour are employed; it is, while upholding these, that 
they kindle and spend their force. AVhen do they lavish 
rhetoric? in glorifying the Saviour of sinners, and in re- 
commending the gospel? — seldom; some of them never. 
But they can, one and all, glow, and burn, and roll 
thunders, and dart their sparks, when the mysteries and 
powers of the church are in question! 

An illustration in harmony with the subject offers it- 
self among the stores of graphic ecclesiastical antiquity, 
where one may find the delineation of this or that sacred 
edifice, fairly depicted in bold lines, and strong colours; 
embossed, loo, and palpable, in its glittering decorations. 
Then there are about it, and about it, flimsy, faint-co- 
loured cherubs, and seraphs, hovering in the clouds, and 
chirping anthems; and, altogether, making a seemly bor- 
der to the temple of St. Peter, or St. Mark. Now, 
much like this is the view of Christianity presented to 
us in the patristic records — there is the church, boldly 
drawn, and bodily laid upon the parchment, so as that 
one may feel its outlines, as well as look at it; and this 
church is mad-e awful to the mind of the spectator by its 
hiding the " terrific mysteries," while around it, and 
over it, flutter the airy figures of spiritual piety — faith, 
hope, charity, joy, peace, and the like; and, to render 
justice to the system, the moral virtues — temperance. 



336 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

self-denial, charity, (almsgiving,) are seen, in substan- 
tial quality, moving in and out of the building, as living 
personages. Yet, such is the general arrangement of 
objects in the piece — such the grouping and the distri- 
bution of light and shade. As to the crowd around, if 
the few and the better taught kept their eye fixed upon 
spiritual objects, the many could do nothing else but look 
directly toward that which, in a practical sense, was 
alone of any consequence to them. They looked to the 
sacraments, which tb.ey were solemnly assured conveyed 
infallibly, and entire, the benefit they were in search of, 
namely, exemption from future peril. Nay, so direct is 
the tendency of perverted human nature toward what- 
ever is visible and formal in religion, that, with the mass 
of men, it was not so much the sacrament, — the whole 
religious rite, — which fixed their attention, as the mere 
material, or instruments of the sacraments: the glassy 
surface of the baptismal pool, as yet unruffled, and re- 
flecting the marbled magnificence of the church, seemed 
the very mirror of eternity, and, as if, while intently 
gazing upon it, the glories of heaven might be dimly 
descried beneath. An analogous instance, and hundreds 
of the like kind might be adduced, I have already re- 
ferred to; 1 mean that of the brother of Ambrose, who 
had been taught to attach such importance to the mere 
eucharistic wafer, as to think that, tied about his neck, 
it would serve him better than the stoutest of the ship's 
timbers, in making his way to land, through the break- 
ers! 

Now, when we have instances of this sort before us, 
the question is not, (the immediate question,) whether 
the notions of the early church concerning the sacra- 
ments, and the wonder-working efficacy of the bread, 
the wine, the water, the oil, the salt, the spittle, were 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 337 

true or false; but whether, in a broad and practical sense, 
the effect of these notions upon the mass of the people, 
nay, upon the best-trained minds, (such, for instance, as 
Satyrus,) was not to invert the order in which the spiri- 
tual, the moral, the ritual, the ecclesiastical elements of 
Christianity, were to be viewed, as compared with the 
order in which they seem to have stood in the view of 
the apostles? I am content that all should turn upon a 
fair reply to this question. 

Say, that catholic teaching, I mean that of the Nicene 
fathers, regarding the sacraments, and other " church 
doctrines," is what we ought to adopt and follow. But 
now I would gladly put the plain question — an histori- 
cal, not a theological question, to any one, competently 
informed, and to any one, who has too much of the feel- 
ings of a gentleman to resort to evasions, and too much 
of the feelings of a Christian to put a false colour or 
varnish upon facts touching religious principles, and too 
much of the feelings of a minister, or public person, to 
compromise, in any manner, his professional character — 
to such a one, I would be glad to put the question — 
Whether, so far as we can judge by their writings, the 
apostles, and the Nicene fathers, and their hearers, re- 
spectively, were accustomed to look at the spiritual, and 
the ritual, elements of Christianity from one and the 
same point of view, or not rather from opposite points of 
view? Who will give me such a reply to this question 
as shall not leave him open to a speedy refutation? 

Shall the answer to such a question be staked upon a 
full exhibition of the style and doctrine of Ambrose, 
concerning the sacraments; or shall we introduce him, 
passionately pleading with God for the soul of Valen- 
linian, who had died uninitiated, unregenerate, unjusti- 

29* 



838 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

fied, that is — unbaptized: — Solve, igitur, Pater Sancte, 
munus servo tuo! Upon the popular mind, what effect 
could the ambiguous, anxious intercession of their trem- 
bling bishop, when thus supplicating mercy for the soul 
of the uninitiated '* servant of God," have had, but that 
of putting the ritual in forefront of the spiritual element 
of religion? In conformity wnth the same notion, the 
church, from an early time, held that the blood of mar- 
tyrdom, although nothing else could, might be held, in 
the case of a catechumen, to supply to the soul the want 
of the water of baptism. 

So the custom, general as it became, of deferring bap- 
tism to the last hour, a custom so utterly opposed lo the 
practice of the apostolic age, whence did it arise, but 
from the doctrine of the church at the time; for the peo- 
ple, estimating, if w^e may so speak, their chances of 
heaven, all things considered, concluded, and not unrea- 
sonably, that, although, in doing so, they incurred the 
fearful risk of meeting death suddenly, or where the 
"regenerating water" could not be obtained, yet, inas- 
much as a death-bed initiation, if it could but be had, 
would cover all defects, and moreover, as sin after bap- 
tism could be expiated, if at all, only in the precarious 
and painful methods of penance, which expiatory pro- 
cess itself might be cut short by death, leaving no re- 
medy whatever; the safer course, although a perilous 
one, was to hold in reserve, to the last, and trusting to 
good fortune, that one remedy^ concerning the efficacy 
of which no doubt could be entertained. This course, 
moreover, had a farther recommendation, incidentally at- 
tached to it, namely, that wiih the sovereign remedy 
still untouched, and at hand, a man might, mean time, 
live as he pleased — only let him be so fortunate, at the 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 339 

last, as to have a kind priest within call, and all would 
be right! In vain the great preachers of the Nicene age 
spent their eloquence in denouncing this impiety. Men 
coolly made their own calculations, and chose to abide 
by what they felt to be their better chance. 

It would be of no avail, in this case, to make a loose 
admission in regard to the Nicene divines, and to say — 
** Yes, we grant that they often express themselves un- 
guardedly ^ or indulge in the language of exaggeration; 
or, while insisting upon some one point, forget too much 
its relative importance — we grant this." Such an apo- 
logy will not cover what it is stretched over. The 
question is not concerning a little more or a little lessi 
or concerning the proprieties of language, but plainly 
concerning the relative position, as apprehended by the 
people at large, of tiie spiritual and the ritual parts of 
Christianity; and it is here affirmed that whereas, in the 
apostolic writings, the spiritual stands foremost, and the 
ritual hindermost (where it appears at all) in the JNicene 
writings, on the contrary, whatever may be said about 
the spiritual, the ritual is so placed as to fix upon itself 
the most intense, if not the exclusive regards of the 
people. And that this was the actual effect of this re- 
versed order, is attested by the simple fact that the peo- 
ple did so interpret the church doctrine, as bearing upon 
their personal conduct; the more religious class taking 
the steep, but certain road to heaven, through virginity, 
and the ascetic discipline; while the many — the less de- 
vout, in all degrees, down to the gross and sensual, either 
secured their salvation within the church, availing them- 
selves carefully of all its customary remedies, or took a 
lodging just under the eaves of it; and, as they hoped, 
within reach of the one great remedy, when the worst 
should come. 



340 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

That is to say, after we have set off from the Nicene 
system, the super-human institute of celibacy, which 
could avail for only a few, then, and for the many, this 
system was precisely what popery has always been — a 

RELIGION OF SACRAMENTS. 

To return then for a moment to the argument of the 
Oxford Tract writer, (No. 85,) if w^e were to grant that 
apostolic Christianity, as conveyed in, and out of the 
New Testament, is also a religion of sacraments, we 
should still have made no progress toward the desired 
point, that of reconciling ourselves to the religion of the 
Nicene age, unless w^e could bring ourselves to affirm 
and believe also, that apostolic Christianity is a religion 
of sacraments foremost, and of spiritual principles hinder- 
most! 

It may be asked by some — " AVhy may we not have 
a religion of sacraments — of church mysteries, and 
church power, and yet, at the same time, give due pro- 
minence to the spiritual and moral realities of the gos- 
pel? Why may w^e not keep the spiritual and the ritual 
fairly abreast one of the other?" Such a question ad- 
mits of three distinct and categorical answers; as First — 
The original constitution of the human mind forbids the 
attempt so to hold elements in equipoise, the very na- 
ture of which is not to occupy one and the same level. 
Secondly, the actual condition of liuman nature, as per- 
versely disposed always to substitute the ritual for the 
spiritual in religion, renders any such attempt to place 
the two evenly before the mind, or otherwise than as 
the scriptures place them, in the last degree, unwise, 
nay, mischievous. Thirdly, God forbids this endeavour, 
bringing as it does his truth upon the very stage which 
all false religions have occupied. 



QUALITY OF NICENE THEOLOGY. 341 

If we appeal to history, in attestation of these three 
answers lo the question pat, the whole course of it comes 
to our ail! in one crowded mass — ail confirming each, 
with undivided force. — It confirms the first and the se- 
cond, together, by showing that, as well among highly 
civilized communities, as among the rudest, where the 
ritual element of religion has been thrown forwards, or 
put out of its place, in relation to the spiritual, the two 
have never, actually, rested for a moment, as if in equi- 
poise; but, on the contrary, there has been an accele- 
rated movement, until th-e spiritual had entirely subsided, 
or retired, leaving nothing but the merest formality, and 
the grossest superstition. The third is confirmed by all 
those instances in which it has become manifest, even 
to the irreligious, that an influence holier and mightier 
than that which man can originate, has been at work 
within the church; for in every such case, the two ele- 
ments have instaritly, and as if by a natural gravitation, 
resumed their due places — ^^that is to say, they have gone 
into the relative position which manifestly they occu- 
pied in ihe apostolic church — the spiritual and the moral 
foremost, and uppermost; and the ritual, not excluded, 
but held in its subordination. Moreover, the first symp- 
tom of decay and decline, has ever been — a revival of 
the ritual part of religion, as a mass of solemn forma- 
lism, and of impious mummeries: — the Ichabod of the 
church has ever borne this very interpretation. 

But there is another, and perhaps a more conclusive, 
or a more afl[*ecting confirmation of the same great prin- 
ciple, afforded by those signal, single instances, in which 
eminent and sincerely religious men have laboured, and 
laboured in vain, from the commencement to the end of 
their public course, to hold the two elements of Chris- 
tianity, the spiritual and the ritual, in equipoise. None 



342 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

have spent their strength, in this endeavour, under more 
advantageous circumstances than did the illustrious John 
Chrysostom. Nor is there any one of the Nicene fa- 
thers to whom an appeal, of this sort, might be made 
with the hope of its being more satisfactory, to all par- 
ties, or more exempt from exceptions of every kind; 
none surpassed him altogether in acquaintance with the 
scriptures, in breadth and richness of intellect, in fer- 
vour of piety, vigour of character, eloquence, and influ-^ 
ence. To name any one of his distinguished contem- 
poraries, of the Greek church, rather than himself, 
would seem to be an intentional disparagement of the 
sacramental cause. To name Augustine, would not be 
conclusive, inasmuch as his reputation, as a theological 
authority, is questioned in this case, and is ambiguous. 
What could an opponent gain by putting in the place of 
the archbishop of Constantinople, either the bishop of 
Milan, or the crabbed monk of Bethlehem, or the bishop 
of Caesarea, or Nazianzen, or Nyssen? and how much 
would they put in peril, by any such substitution? 

Now, if we take this great divine as our conclusive 
instance, it will appear (or it must be granted by those 
who are at all familiar with his writings,) that the whole 
of his ecclesiastical course was a struggle, an agony, in- 
cited by the vehement endeavour to keep, in even equi- 
poise, the spiritual and the ritual elements of religion. 
How does he toil and pant in this bootless task! Per- 
sonally, too much alive to the spiritual and vital reality 
of the Christian scheme to be quietly willing, like most 
of his contemporaries, to let it subside, and totally dis- 
appear, and yet far too deeply imbued with, at once, the 
gnostic and the Brahminical feeling, and too intimately 
compromised, as a public person, with the *' church doc^ 
trines" of the times, he could never rest, as did others; 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 343 

but was ever tossing from side to side, like one borne 
helplessly on by an impetuous tide, through a narrow and 
winding Hellespont: — now thrown upon the steep Asi- 
atic shore, and now, as by a sudden eddy, carried right 
athwart the current, toward the European shallows. 
Few great writers offer so little repose as Chrysostom; 
few present contrasts so violent; and they are contrasts 
of apparent intention, as if his own guiding motive — his 
cynosure, had been a binary star, shedding contrary in- 
fluences upon his course: and so it was in fact. Scarcely 
is there a homily all of a piece, hardly are there two 
consecutive passages that can be read without a surprisCj 
amounting to a painful perplexity, until the secret of all 
this perpetual contrariety is understood; and then it be- 
comes manifest enough that, within the writer's soul, a 
spiritual and substantial Christianity, which should have 
been uppermost, was ever wrestling with church doc- 
trines, and gnostic sentiments, which ivoidd be upper- 
most. From no one of the Nicene fatiiers might extracts 
be made so nearly satisfactory to a protestant ear; from 
no one may there be gathered wilder extravagances, 
such as the papist makes his boast of; and from no divine 
of any age or communion, could such instances be ad- 
duced of the two kinds in intimate combination. 

Nevertheless the convulsive effortspentitself in vain: — 
the laws of human nature, and its perversity, and, not 
less, the eternal constitutions of heaven prevailed, and 
severally took their proper effect. Chrysostom left 
Nicene Christianity what he found it — a religion of 
asceticism, and of sacraments, and of high " church 
principles." And if we want proof of this, we may 
either look to the actual and well-known condition of 
the Greek church, in the next age; or, into his own 
wTitings, and especially into those parts of them in 



344 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

which, from the nature of the subject, and the occasion> 
the real relative position of the superior, and the infe- 
rior elements of religion, is conspicuously placed before 
us. To such an instance I will now appeal, and I do 
so with the confidence that it ought to be accepted as 
satisfactory and conclusive, and that it will be so accept- 
ed by the candid inquirer. 

What is Christian repentance? is it a refined species 
of natural remorse? is it, as compared with philosophical 
reform, a better omened endeavour of the moral nature, 
to purify itself, and set out anew on the path of virtue? 
®r is it not rather a deep and lasting commotion of the 
affections, the moral sentiments, originated from above,, 
and having for its impulse, and its centre, those facts 
and principles which are peculiar to the gospel? I as- 
sume that this is the trrue description, or, at least, the 
truer of the twoi and then it will follow that, if a well- 
informed and devout writer, and a leader of opinion, is 
found treating a subject such as this, which may be 
called the preliminary of piety, and which touches inti- 
mately and directly the rudiments of Christianity — if 
such a writer shall be found so treating this subject, as 
that the practical result, upon the mass of minds, shall 
be to favour their own perverse propensity to addict 
themselves to the forms and the austerities of religion^ 
and to forget its higher elements, then, and in such an 
instance, we are clearly justified in affirming that the 
Christianity of the age had slid from its original founda- 
tions, and had become effectively corrupt. 

Let us then give more than a moment's attention to 
Chrysostom's treatise on Repentance (tom. ii. pp. 328 — 
414) — a careful composition, comprised in nine homi- 
lies, and occupying a space equivalent to the tract now 
m the reader's hand. We may therefore well look int© 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 345 

it with the expectation of finding there a fair sample of 
the writer's principles, and mode of teaching. In ad- 
vancing upon this ground I especially challenge the 
reader's attention to the fact, that those passages which 
I may cite, or refer to — and with pleasure, as of a re- 
deeming quality, that is to say, evangelical and ani- 
mating, and nearly allied to our protestant notions, are 
peculiarly pertinent to my immediate purpose, inasmuch 
as they show that the sacramental principles, and the 
*' church doctrines," which, at the same time, the 
preacher laboured so strenuously to maintain, possessed, 
in this instance, all the advantage they could derive from 
their being associated with the better and purer elements 
of Christianity. It is not as if I were here adducing 
some one of the blind and florid orators of the same age, 
whose enormities of superstition are barely, or not at 
all relieved, by any indications of genuine pious feeling. 
Who is there that shall come after Chrysostom, and hope 
to give the ritual principle a better chance than he gave 
it, of recommending itself to our approval? Moreover, 
I must ask the reader to keep in view the striking indi- 
cations he will m.eet with, as we go on, of the connex- 
ion of the celibate with Chrysostom's theological sys- 
tem, of which, in fact, it was the master-principle. 

To preclude any objection, I will premise a note of 
the learned editor, concerning the last three homilies^ 
" The seventh, eighth, and ninth homilies, do not offer 
the same indications of genuineness (as the others.) The 
style is inferior to that of Chrysostom, in elegance; and 
therefore it is not without some scruple, that we leave 
them standing among his undoubted writings; and yet 
we have not thought it proper to set them aside, espe-^ 
eially considering (as we have elsewhere stated) that our' 
holy doctor is not always himself, as it regards language 

m 



346 MEANS DF ESTIMATING THE 

and manner: other homilies indeed we have in hand, on 
the same subject, which, as being manifestly spurious^ 
we have thrown into the appendix." 

The homilies on Repentance were pronounced on suc- 
cessive Sundays to his flock, (at Antioch) after an ab-^ 
sence in the country, for the recovery of his health, 
during which, as he declares, their welfare, and them- 
selves, were ever present to his mind. They express, 
therefore, not the liurried emotions of an overburdened 
public course, but the calm and refreshed sentiments that 
return upon a well ordered mind, in a season of seclusion 
-—seclusion amidst the scenes of nature; and when the 
perturbations of the soul, and its ambition, have been 
stilled by the languors of disease. Now certainly we 
shall find the Christian preacher himself. 

The tirst of these homilies is occupied chiefly with 
illustrations of the opposite dangers of desperation, or 
despondency, and of inertness, or indifference, in reli- 
gion. Among these illustrations, and for the purpose 
of checking despondency, (as promoted by the Novatian 
doctrine) he adduces the parable of the prodigal son, 
proving, as it does, that repentance is possible, and the 
remission of sins attainable, after baptism — a point else- 
where held to be very doubtful. " The prodigal son 
answers," says Chrysostora, '* to those who fall after 
baptism: he does so, inasmuch as he is called a 5on; for 
none are sons apart from baptism, with which are con- 
nected all the benefits of heirsliip, and a community of 
interests with the family. He is called moreover the 
brother of him who was approved; but there is no fra- 
ternity (in the church) without the spiritual regeneration" 
(baptism.) The second homily opens in a manner very 
characteiistic of the preacher's style. *' Last Sunday 
did ye witness a fight and a victory? the fight indeed of 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 347 

the devil, and the victory of Christ? Have ye seen the 
commendation of repentance, and the wound of the 
devil, and how ill he bore it, and how he trembled and 
shuddered? Wherefore didst tiiou fear, O devil, while 
repentance was commended? why groan? why shudder? 
Properly enough, says he, doj groan, and trouble my- 
self, for this same repentance snatches from me my 
choicest treasures." 

"-.^The first course or path of repentance is confess 
sion: Come to church, and acknowledge your sin: come, 
if you are a sinner, that you may profess repentance: 
come, if you are one of the just, that you fall not from 
your righteousness." Some indeed would lay the foun- 
dation of (Christian) repentance a little lower, and speak, 
first of all, of that conviction of guilt, impotency, and 
danger, which the Spirit infuses, and which takes its 
force from the doctrine of the atonement. Not so 
the divine before us, who introduces no topic of this 
sort. *' Sinner! be beforehand with the devil — put him 
out of his office, which is that of accuser. Enter the 
church, and say to God — I have sinned. Nothing else 
do I ask of thee: . . . acknowledge sin, that thou mayest 
loosen sin!" Then follow various examples in point. 

But there is a second means of repentance, *'and 
what may that be? Weeping for sin. Hast thou sinned? 
W^eep, and thou shalt absolve sin. Is this a great mat- 
ter? Nothing more do I require of thee, than this — to 
weep for sin." In confirmation of which doctrine the 
instances are adduced, to wit Ahab, and the Ninevites. 

There is, however, a third means of repentance; '' for 
I have mentioned many, that the way of salvation may 
be made the more easy to thee: and what is that? Hu- 
mility. Be lowly in mind, and thou hast broken the 
bonds of thy sins." The proof and instance we have 



348 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

in the parable of the pharisee and the publican; and the 
way in which Chrysostom treats this instance, demands 
to be noticed. The pharisee, through his arrogance and 
uncharitableness, retired from the temple, having lost 
his JiKsitoa-vvn, whereas the publican, by his humiliation, 
had acquired what he had not before. But here we 
might ask, whether, in fact, the pharisee had any genu^ 
ine righteousness to lose? let this however pass, while 
we endeavour to ascertain, from what follows, our 
preacher's notion of this same humility, which is one of 
the elements of true repentance. " The publican's hu- 
mility, then, after all, barely deserved the name; since 
his confession — I am a sinner, was nothing more than 
fJie mere truth; but humility indeed is shown when one 
who is really great, humbles himself. Now who is a 

sinner if a publican be not one? Wherefore if 

even this publican, sinner as he was, obtained this great 
boon, justification, upon his showing a humiliation, 
which indeed was mere truth, how much rather shall 
he be so favoured, who, while he is ivupiroc, a proficient 
in virtue, nevertheless humbles himself? .... Where- 
fore, if thou confess thy sins, and humblest thyself, thou 
becomest just. But wonidst thou learn who it is that is 
truly humble? Look at Paul, who was humble indeed. 
Paul the teacher of the wide world — Paul the spiritual 
orator, the elect vessel, the unbillowed harbour, the un- 
shaken tower — Paul, who, little as he was, traversed the 
world, moving from land to land as if winged; look at 
such a one, esteeming himself so little — unlearned, al- 
though a philosopher; poor, although rich; such a one, 
I say, humble indeed, who engaged in innumerable 
toils," &LC. &c. Then follows a pnge nearly, of that sort 
of adulatory exaggeration, lifting Paul to the piimacle 
of praise, and above it, which so often offends the ear ii\ 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 349 

tlie patristic pulpit oratory: the purport of the whole be- 
ing to show, by the comparison between the publican and 
the apostle, how great and sure must be the "justifying 
efficacy *' of humility, if, even when it consisted in the 
simple confession of a naked truth, it procured this boon, 
failing far sjjort as it did of the transcendental humilia- 
tion of such a huly doctor and illustrious philosopher as 
Paul! 

I do not know how this may sound in other ears; but 
in mine it sounds ill; and it seems to imply a sad mis- 
understanding of the true grounds and properties of 
Christian humility. Not very unlike is it to what one 
may find in the "Ethics" of a famous pagan, much 
read and esteemed in certain high places; but altogether 
unlike any thing found in the New Testament — unless 
it be the portrait of the pharisee of the parable and of his 
fellows. Chrysostom does in effect put the feeling of 
the — " God, I thank thee, I am not as other men," into 
the lips of the apostle, wiio surely, from the moment 
that the light shone upon him in the road to Damascus, 
had renounced every such notion of his own merits, as 
well as of the merit of his renunciation of merit. 

" You have forgotten every word I said to you last 
Sunday — the beginning, the middle, and the end. Is it 
not so? But I will not upbraid you; you have your 
families to mind, your homes to take care of, your ser- 
vices to fulfil, your crafts to follow, while we think of 
nothing but these sacred themes. Well; be it so; I 
commend you, at least, that, leaving every thing, you 
come to cliurch, without fail, on a Sunday." Thus, in 
substance, opens the third [iomil3^ I hope I shall not 
seem to be advancing a captious refinement in saying 
that, when the preacher returns to his theme, he makes 

ai representation which is doctrinally erroneous, and big 

30* 



850 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

with practical mistakes: ]et us hear him. " I have said 
that many and various are the roads of repentance, so 
that salvation may be rendered the more easy. For if 
He had given lis one only way, we might have rejected 
it, saying we cannot follow that path, and therefore can- 
not be saved. But now, cutting off from thee any such 
pretext, he hath afforded thee, not one way only, nor a 
second only, nor a third only; but many and different; 
so that the ascent to heaven may be rendered as easy to 
thee as possible!" 

Surely this is at the best blind teaching, and so blind 
as to border upon sheer nonsense, and nonsense of the 
worst tendency; or if sense, then downright error. So 
far as there could be any good sense attached to Chry- 
sostom's statement, in his former homilies, that there 
are ''several paths of repentance," it must mean that 
repentance has various ingredients, or conditions, each 
indispensable, and altogether necessary to its perfec- 
tion; bat here we find him, as it were, standing on the 
plain, and pointing to the mount of God, and saying, 
yonder is the heavenly hill; and how indulgently has 
He dealt with you, who invites you thither; for he has 
opened many paths, each of which leads to the gate; 
and if you find one of them to be too steep, or rugged, 
or on any account not agreeable, you may turn and take 
another. 'J'hat is to say^— ^if you don't relish confession, 
shed a plenty of tears, and that will do; or if tears are 
not fleet enough with you, practise humiliation, and that 
will do: and then he goes on to open yet other paths, 
each independent of the oth.er, and each infallible. If 
this be not merely foolish, it is intensely false doctrine; 
and whether it be most foolish, or most false, it could 
not be otherwise than in the last degree pernicious. 
What, however, we have to notice particularly is the 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 351 

secret consistency of errors, such as these, with the 
master error of the ancient churcli — the independent ef- 
ficacy of the mere sacraments, when duly solemnized. 
The same principle which led Chrysostom to tell the 
people — *' only let us dip you, and you are regenerate, 
justified, and ready for heaven," impelled him to say 
also — This mode of penitence, or that, or that, duly 
made use of, will save you; and one of them nearly as 
well as another. 

But the fourth road of repentance! and what may that 
be? Almsgiving! — the queen of virtues, and the readiest 
of all ways of getting into heaven. Then follows the 
egregious passage, concerning the combined merits of 
almsgiving and virginity, of which I have already pro- 
duced a sufficient sample. In this instance, however, it 
appears that the two courses must coincide; that is to 
say, how straightforward soever may be the road to 
heaven, through virginity, you may not think to walk 
in it unaccompanied by almsgiving! Nothing can be 
much more distinct than is lant^uao^e such as the fol- 
lowing — 

" But now that I come to speak of the way of alms- 
giving (as a path of repentance) our discourse becomes 
animated. Already we have said that almsgiving is a 
vast possession; thence advancing, the open sea of vir- 
ginity receives us. Thou hast, therefore, the capital 
(species of) repentance by almsgiving; which is able to 
absolve thee from the bonds of ihy sins; and yet again 
thou hast another path of repentance, as ready as possi- 
ble, by which thou mayest get a discharge from thy sins. 
Pray every hour." It may be said, all this is only an 
incautious mode of strongly stating the force and effica- 
cy of humility, of charity, of prayer, and so forth; and 
that, with a little trimming, it may all be understood in 



352 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

a good sense. But was it likely to be so understood by 
the mass of the people, and especially when they were 
constantly exposed to the same ill-jndged and delusive 
mode of teaching? Or, to put another question, tending 
to the same point — Is any such indiscretion of style 
fallen into by men who themselves understand the gos- 
pel scheme of salvation, and who moreover well know 
how prone men are to find out, and to follow some by- 
path to heaven? It is not, in fact, until after the church 
has Zon^ lost its hold of the truth, that men of so much 
intelligence, fervour, and upright intention, as belonged 
to Chrysostom, are found using language so dark and 
fatal. 

Our great preacher, as he goes along, takes care, from 
time to time, to make the people understand that it is 
"in church" that a truce with heaven, on whatever 
terms obtained, is to be ratified. " Hast thou sinned? 
Enter the church, and wipe out thy sin." 

The fourth homily treats of the consolations of repen- 
tance; among which are those derived from the instances 
afforded in scripture of its eiBcacy; and we are more- 
over told to follow the example of the saints, proficients 
in philosophy, who did not sufler themselves either to 
be depressed by calamities, or elated by prosperity. We 
are moreover to betake ourselves to God, who is ever 
accessible. *' At all times, beloved, let us take refuge 
in God, who is at once willing and able to release us 
from our misfortunes: it is otherwise in our approaches 
to men .... But as to God, there intervenes nothing 
of the sort between us and him, who may be entreated, 
without a mediator (it is not to be imagined that Chry- 
sostom here intends to exclude the mediatorial ofTice of 
Christ) without wealth, without cost, he yields to prayer: 
sufficient is it to cry out from the heart, and to offer 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 353 

tears, and immediately entering in, thou mayest draw 
him to thy part." 

Let our preacher have the benefit of all that is rational 
and scriptural in this passage, without deduction on the 
score of its questionable phraseology. 

The fifth of these homilies is esteemed as one of Chry- 
sostom's happiest compositions: is then its subject the 
gracious influence of the Holy Spirit in softening the 
heart, and in consoling it? Is it the power and willing- 
ness of Christ to deliver the penitent from guilt and 
fear? is it the sufficiency of the atonement? or the effi- 
cacy of the Redeemer's mediation? no such themes oc- 
cupy the eloquent preacher, on this occasion; but in- 
stead of them we have — The efficacy and merits of 
Fasting! Need we ask whether evangelic warmth, and 
purity of doctrine, or whether a dead and delusive for-- 
malism w^e the characteristic of the Nicene church? 
But let us push our way through the applauding crowd, 
toward the preacher: with what a trumpet blast does he 
usher in — is it the Saviour, the King of Glory? no, 
alas! but the awful personage whom he challenges as a 
tremendous prince — Fasting! terrible indeed; yet not to 
Christians, but to the race of demons! His approach is, 
to us, like that of some august monarch, when his en- 
trance into his capital is announced! and yet if we may 
credit the intimate confessions of an illustrious modern 
professor of "church doctrines," this same awful per- 
sonage wears sometimes a very grim visage, even when 
looked at by his meekest admirers; so much so, as that 
the favour of a few hours of his company has driven the 
votary, nolens volens, to seek the consolations of " tea 
with cream and buttered toast!" But we hasten from 
the cloisters of Oxford to the great church at Antioch, 
and step back from the Christianity of the nineteenth 
century, to that of the fourth. 



354 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

*' Wouldst thou learn what an ornament to men is — 
Fasting, and what a guard and preservative? Look well 
to the monastic tribe, blessed and admirable as it is! 
For these, fleeing from the tumults of common life, and 
running away to the summits of mountains^ rear their 
huts in the tranquil wilderness; as it were moored in a 
sheltered creek, and thither lead with them fasting, as 
the companion of their lives. Wherefore it — (fasting) 
makes angels of them, men as they are. Nor these 
alone (the eremites) but those also who, in the midst of 
cities (the ccEuobites) by the same means, reach the 
pitch of philosophy. . . . Wherefore God, at the mo- 
ment when he made man, instantly committed him into 
the hands of Fasting as to a loving mother, and excel- 
lent mistress, intrusted with his welfare. . . If then 
fasting were indispensable even in paradise, (Gen. ii. 
16) how much more so out of paradise? If this drug 
were beneficial before the wound had been received, 
how much more after? . . . Hast thou observed how 
God's anger was kindled by a contempt put upon fast- 
ing? (in Adam's sin.) Learn how he rejoices when it is 
honoured!" Then follow the scripture instances; among 
them that of Peter (the immediate subject, fasting, 
having been dropt) who, notwithstanding his denying his 
Master, was, after a brief but fervent penitence, restored 
to his dignity as *' the praefect of the universal church." 
But to return to the virtues of fasting; see the instance 
of Daniel, and of the three children. How was it that 
the body of the one escaped the teeth of the lions, and 
the bodies of the others the power of the furnace? — 
" Ask Fasting, and it shall answer thee, and clear up 
this enigma." But inasmuch as physicians recommend 
that powerful remedies should not be administered upon 
a full stomach, lest they be too much for the strength of 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 355 

the patient, so should our use of that potent drug, Fast- 
ing, be preceded by a degree of moderation. But if it 
be resorted to when the body has already been some- 
what reduced, and the mind sobered, it, to (papjuAKov ^ will 
the more surely avail for the purging of the multitude of 
old sins. It is worthy of notice that, whereas in the 
exordium of this homily. Fasting is introduced as an 
august prince, in the peroration, he makes his appear- 
ance in a new character (so regarded by too many) as a 
wild beast. Moreover, in what sense practically our 
preacher's doctrine was understood, by the mass of the 
people, may be gathered from such indications as these. 
*'If I shall ask you. Why have you been to the bath to- 
day? you reply. To cleanse the body, in preparation for 
the fast. But if I ask. And why did you get drunk (yes- 
terday?) again thou wilt reply, Because I am to fast to- 
day." So much for this elaborate discourse upon the 
duty and benefits of fasting, as a way or means of repent- 
ance! Apart from the customary doxology at the end, 
neither the love of God nor the grace of the Lord Jesus 
Christ, nor the communion of the Holy Spirit, has any 
place or part in this celebrated sermon. 

The sixth homily resumes the subject of fasting, and 
offers some rational corrective advices, to those who had 
just practised it; dehorting the people from the custo- 
mary rush toward the amusements of the theatre; or, as 
we may say, of tlie carnivaL Nothing affecting our 
present purpose, or nothing new, offers itself in this 
sermon. The next, the genuineness of which need not 
be questioned on account of its doctrine, affords in- 
stances of that celerity, in passing from the spiritual 
or evangelic, to the formal side of any subject, which is 
the characteristic of the Nicene writings. When the 
€ye is caught by a text which might suggest a strain of 



356 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE^ 

a happier kind, a disappointment almost always ensues; 
and if there be two admissible modes of commenting 
upon a passage of scripture, the one which is the most 
ambiguous, and the most open to a dangerous miscon- 
ception, is most often the one adopted. *' In the gos- 
pel for to-day, ye have heard the Saviour saying to the 
paralytic — Son, thy sins, which are many, are forgiven 
thee. Now the forgiveness of sins is the well-spring of 
salvation, and the premium, iTTAQxov, of repentance. Re- 
pentance is the efficacious remedy of sin; a heavenly 
gift, an admirable power, a gracious victory over the 
penalty of laws." How much better a method of popu- 
lar teaching is it to insist rather upon the first cause, 
than upon the proximate causes of our deliverance from 
guilt and condemnation! 

Farther on in this seventh homily, there is a repeti- 
tion which the preacher excuses, on account of the im- 
portance he attaches to the subject, of his doctrine con^ 
cerning the all-availing merits of almsgiving, and with 
an addition which could not but thicken the darkness al- 
ready shed upon the one and only path of salvation. 
It seems as if Chrysostom were doing his utmost to put 
out of view the true principle of Christian beneficence, 
and to substitute the most sordid and mercenary motives. 
Condensing the paragraph, the substance of it is to this 
effect — If a cup of cold water, which costs nothing, 
merits, and shall obtain its reward; with how vast a re- 
ward shall the equitable Judge remunerate munificent 
charities, and the costly bestowment of garments, mo- 
ney, and the like. Should we regard the following, as 
any thing more than a foolish extravagance, certainly of 
very ill tendency? *' He that pitieth the poor, lendeth 
to the Lord. Now if we lend to God, we make him 
our debtor. Which of the two then wouldst thoa havs^ 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 357 

him to be — thy debtor, or thy judge? The debtor re- 
verences his creditor^ the judge entreats not the debtor." 

Among the many repetitions which occur in these ho- 
milies, one hopes to find amended in one place, what 
has been wrongly put in another; but the preacher's 
own mind having too far lost its hold of the great prin- 
ciple of the gospel, he does but diversify a little his con- 
fused notions of the scheme of salvation. Thus, in the 
early part of the eighth homily, he seems to be ap- 
proaching a better doctrine, while speaking of the divine 
mercy; and yet hardly reaches higher than to the level 
of a " gospel according to David." Seldom, that is to 
say three or four times, in the course of this elaborate 
treatise, does he satisfy the Christian ear; as thus: — 
«^' Such is the goodness of God, that, to save a servant, 
he spared not his only Son; delivering up his only-be- 
gotten, that he might redeem his unthankful servants, 
and laying down the blood of his Son as the price of 
their deliverance. Oh the goodness of the Lord! Say 
not then to me again, I have sinned much, how can I 
be saved? Thou art not able to effect this, but thy Lord 
is able, and so able as to blot out thy transgressions." 

Few, and far between, are passages of this sort. 
When they occur, they serve to confirm our general con- 
clusion, that a religious system, combining capital errors 
with something, or even much, of what is true, still 
takes its character, as a practical doctrine, from its er- 
rors, rather than from its truths. So it has always been 
with popery, and so was it, as history clearly shows, with 
the Greek church: which became altogether such as the 
Nicene delusions tended to make it, a religion of super- 
stition, of formalism, and of the most puerile mumme- 
nsB. What the actual and immediate effect of Chry- 

31 



ik^ 



358 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

sostom's own preaching was, may be gathered, but too 
plainly, from his constant tone and style, whicli do not 
seem to imply that he felt himself to be addressing spi- 
ritually minded and consistent Christians; but rather 
the loose church-going and play-going rabble, high and 
low, of a debauched and luxurious city. That his con- 
gregation was actually of this sort, is, I think, a fact 
that is borne on the face of all his homilies. More- 
over, the significant, though usual consequence of ex- 
aggerating the ritual part of religion, at the cost of the 
spiritual, namely, that the rites themselves came to be 
contemned by a large portion of the people, is also ap- 
parent. It is nothing but a straightforward and energe- 
tic teaching of Truth — spiritual truth, that can bring, 
even the rites of religion into general esteem. In cor- 
roboration of this principle, it may be well to cite a pas- 
sage or two from the ninth and last homily on Repent- 
ance, especially as we shall, at the same time, obtain a 
specimen of our preacher's style of speaking of the eu- 
charislic rite — lauded more than the Saviour, and never- 
theless held in contempt, spite of the preacher's vehe- 
ment upbraidings, by the people. 

Toward the close of this ninth homily (and of the 
treatise) Chrysostom turns toward those who, even during 
the hour when the rites of the *' dreadful and mystic 
table " were celebrating, lounged their time away in idle 
company, and, who, in doing so, belied the profession 
they had just made in taking part in the liturgical lan- 
guage. " Art thou not afraid, dost thou not blush, to 
be found a liar at that very hour? What! the mystic 
table has been prepared; the Lamb of God for thee is 
slaughtered; the priest for thee contends — the spiritual 
fire from the sacred table ascends; the cherubim holding 
their stations round about, while the seraphim hovering 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 359 

around, and the six-winged veiling their faces, while for 
thee all the incorporeal orders, along with tlie priest, 
intercede. The spiritual fire descends; and for thy pu- 
rification, the blood from the spotless side is emptied 
into the cup, and thou, dost thou neither tremble nor 
blush, to be found false (to thy professions) at this 
dread hour! A hundred sixty and eight hours are there 
in the week, and one only of these has God set apart 
for himself; and this one dost thou devour in worldly 
business, in merriment, or in any thing that may chance 
to come in thy way! With what assurance then canst 
thou afterwards (at any other time) approach the myste- 
ries? with a conscience how defiled! Wouldst thou 
dare, with dung in thy hands, to touch the skirts of an 
earthly monarch? Far from it. Not as bread shouldst 
thou look at that (bread) neither esteem that (cup) as 
wine; for not like other aliment do these (elements) de- 
scend into the draught. Far be it; think no such thing, 
for just as wax, held to the fire, suffers no detriment, as 
to its substance, although melted all away; in like man- 
ner hold it to be true, that the substance of the myste- 
ries is absorbed by the body (of the participant:) where- 
fore, when ye approach (the table) think not that ye re- 
ceive the divine body, as from the hand of man; but ra- 
ther as was the fire from the tongs of the very seraphina 
given to Isaiah!" 

Although not inseparably connected with my imme- 
diate argument, I feel it impossible to pass the above- 
cited passage v/ithout directing the clerical reader to a 
comparison, which indeed can hardly have failed to 
force itself upon his own mind, while reading it. Is the 
style, temper, and obvious popular import, of Chrysos- 
tom's language, as here quoted, one and the same with 
that of the church ©f England? I would put it to the 



380 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

clerical reader, whether he could think it one and the 
same thing to read, before the communion, this speci- 
men of Nicene Christianity, or the exhortation actually- 
appointed, by the English church, to be read, *' In case 
the minister shall see the people negligent," &c. What 
dignity, what simplicity, what fervour, in the one: what 
extravagance, what superstition, what revolting pre- 
sumption in the oth^r! I verily believe that, even the 
most thorough-going of the Oxford Tract divines would 
>shudder at the thought of such a substitution; and I am 
sure the majority of the clergy would regard it as no- 
thing less than a treason to the protestant church to ad- 
mit it. There may perhaps be a distinction, which 
however I have never been able to retain my hold of, 
between the Nicene doctrine, of the eucharist, and that 
of the church of Rome; but whatever logical and acute- 
ly analytic minds may make of such a distinction, this 
is clear enough, that, in the view of the people at large, 
the two doctrines are not two, but one, practically the 
same, and alike tending to fix the gross apprehensions 
of the people upon the mere rite, to the exclusion of 
whatever is spiritual in religion. 

Opportunity, 1 hope, will be afforded me, when the 
ground has been cleared for that purpose, for placing, in 
broad contrast, the Nicene and the English churches, 
which, allied as they may be by the retention of half a 
dozen ambiguous phrases, differ substantially, and im- 
measurably. Such a contrast, extreme as it is in its es- 
sential features, would warrant an appeal to the honour 
and conscience, to the good sense, and to the Christian 
feeling of every clergyman, and the appeal would be to 
this effect — Do you adhere to the Nicene fathers, or to 
the English reformers? The Oxford Tract controversy 
can have no other issue, when the whole question comes 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 361 

to be fully understood, than that of compelling every 
clergyman to make his choice, in this momentous alter- 
native. 

But, to resume my immediate argument. We have 
reviewed Chrysostom's nine homilies on repentance. I 
can imagine no reason v^hy this set of sermons should 
not be appealed to as a fair sample of the doctrine, and 
of the ordinary style, of the great Nicene divines. 
Whatever it presents which may startle our modern and 
protestant ears, may be matched with the greatest ease, 
from the pages of the same writer, and his contempora- 
ries; nor would any purpose be answered by demurring 
at the sense attributed to this or that phrase, or passage. 
Chrysostom's meaning, to the very same effect, may be 
gathered from many other places. 

The reader has seen upon wliat points of doctrine and 
practice the ])reacher chiefly, and the most earnestly, if 
not exclusively, insists: — we have heard him, most in- 
cautiously, recommending the several accompaniments, 
or ingredients, of repentance, as severally sufficient for 
securing salvation; a mode of speaking as grossly delu- 
sive, as any thing tliat is met with in the worst Romish 
writers of the worst times. It has, moreover, appeared, 
that, while extraordinary importance is attached by him 
to almsgiving, as a direct means of salvation, the preacher 
reserves his choicest rhetoric, as a free-will offering, to 
be laid upon the altar of celestial virginity: this he feels 
to be the real strength of the system he is upholding. 

But, now, what is it that we do not find, in these 
noted homilies? Alas! (some few phrases allowed for) 
what we do not find is — Christianity itself. In particu- 
lar, there is barely any thing, although the subject seems 
necessarily to involve it, concerning the work of the 

31* 



362 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

Holy Spirit, in softening and renewing the dead, callous, 
and depraved affections of man. No, for in the place 
of the work of the Spirit, we have the wonders of the 
"justifying pool." There are two or three passages, 
affirming the remission of sins, through the merits of 
Christ's death; but, then, neither is this truth expanded, 
abstractedly, nor is it connected with Paul's doctrine of 
justification by faith, nor, which is the worst omission, 
(because it implies a positive error,) is the vicarious 
work of Christ in any way represented as the spring or 
reason of genuine repentance. Tliis is surely a fatal 
deficiency. Another omission, highly significant as it 
respects our present purpose, must be noticed — namely, 
the absence of any of those pointed cautions, which a 
well-informed Christian minister, knowing what human 
nature is, invariably introduces, when he is insisting 
upon tiie accessories of piety. Let us suppose that a 
preacher is urging upon his hearers the importance of 
prayer, humility, almsgiving, and the like, as indispen- 
sable accompaniments of a genuine repentance, will he 
fail to warn the formal, and the self-righteous, of the 
danger of a pharisaic substitution of these things, for the 
grace, and power, and merit of the Saviour? Very few, 
now-a-days, would approach Chrysostom's incautious 
style in these instances; nor any, but the most blind, 
omit those correctives, apart from which this mode of 
teaching reaches the flagitious quality of the worst he- 
resy. 

Nicene Christianity, then, taken in its fairest samples, 
and weighed in the balances of common sense and scrip- 
ture, or put in the scales of the cliurch of England, and 
compared with the articles and homilies, and with the 
lives and writings of the English reformers, is it not 
found wanting? Does it not well deserve our indignant 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 363 

reprobation, when it is proposed to us as our model and 
authority? By Nicene Christianity must be meant, if 
any thing is meant, not* a shadowy form of things, 
which we may fondly imagine to have had place some- 
where, we know not where, and to have been in its per- 
fection at some time, we know not when; but precisely 
the system, doctrinal, ritual, and ecclesiastical, which 
meets us in passing up and down, through the extant 
works of the divines of the third, fourth, and fifth cen- 
turies. This, then, is the system which, although it has 
iong been reverenced under favour of a disingenuous 
concealment, must fall into contempt; nothing can save 
it, when once it comes to be fully understood. Let but 
a patient hearing be given to the naked evidence, and 
the result is inevitable; nor can it be long delayed. 

There is yet a consideration suggested, not remotely, 
by the instance I have adduced. — Let it be said that nei- 
ther Chrysostom, nor his contemporaries, whatever may 
seem to be the import of their language, held the doc- 
trines we hear them sometimes affirming, uncorrected, 
in a sufficient degree, by the vital principles of Christi- 
anity. 

Be it so, then, that the '* church principles" so stre- 
nuously maintained by the Nicene divines, were, in fact, 
although we cannot perceive it, duly balanced by more 
spiritual elements; and, in a word, that the counterpoise 
was just such as we might wish to see realized among 
ourselves. But how is any such hypothesis sustained 
by history? — if there be any meaning in history. 

The florid orators, bishops and great divines of the 
fourth century, we find, one and all, throughout the east, 
throughout the west, throughout the African churclj, 
lauding and lifting to the skies whatever is formal in re- 
ligion, whatever is external, accessory, ritual, ecciesi- 



364 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

astical: it was upon these things that they spent their 
strength; it was these that strung their energies, these 
that fired theh' souls. Virginity they put first and fore- 
most; then came maceration of the body, tears, psalm- 
singing, prostrations on the bare earth, humiliations, alms- 
giving, expiatory labours and sufferings, the kind ofhces 
of the saints in heaven, the wonder-working efficacy of 
the sacraments, the unutterable powers of the clergy: 
these were the rife and favoured themes of animated ser- 
mons, and of prolix treatises; and such was the style, 
temper, spirit, and practice of the church, from the 
banks of the Tigris, to the shores of the Atlantic, and 
from the Scandinavian morasses, to the burning sands 
of the great desert; such, so far as our extant materials 
give us any information. And all this was what it should 
have been! and this is what now we should be tending 
toward! 

But now, what was the condition of the (so called) 
Christian church, -as thus taught, trained, and hopefully 
sent forward by the Nicene fathers, within the short 
period of tw^o hundred years? Well would it be if this 
condition, as well of the east as of the west, at the open- 
ing of the seventh century, were far better understood 
among us than it appears to be: we should then entirely 
leave off blaming the church of Rome, as liaving de- 
bauched the Christian world; and sliould retreat with 
alarm, with pity, v/ith disgust, from Nicene Christianity. 

Within the short period of two hundred years from 
the death of Chrysostom, and within less than a century 
from the death of the men whom lie and his contempo- 
raries had trained, and while still the Nicene system 
retained its integrity, Mahomet broke upon the world, 
and the tempest of heresy which he raised, came as a 
blast of health upon the nations. What Mahomet and 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 365 

his caliphs found in all directions, whither their cimeters 
cut a path for them, was a superstition so abject, an ido- 
latry so gross and shameless, church doctrines so arro- 
gant, church practices so dissolute and so puerile, that 
the strong-minded Arabians felt themselves inspired anew 
as God's messengers to reprove the errors of the world, 
and authorized as God's avengers to punish apostate 
Christendom. The son of the bond-woman was let 
loose from his deserts, to "mock" and to chastise the 
son of the free-woman. We read, in the story of the 
moslem conquests, a commentary, written by the finger 
of God, upon Nicene Christianity. Or, if we will not, 
in that terrible history, acknowledge God's displeasure 
against this system of fraud, folly, and impiety, we can 
hardly refuse to listen to the notices contained in the 
Koran, and the Mahometan writers, of the impression 
that had been made upon the Arabian mind by the spec- 
tacle of the debauched Christianity of the Greek and 
African churches. It is here that we may the most 
surely learn what was the actual result of the system 
imbodied in the writings of Chrysostom, Basil, Gregory, 
Cyril, and their contemporaries. 

Does it seem, then, when Ave come to look into his- 
tory, as if these same ''church principles" were, in- 
deed, the true and wisely-chosen vehicles and preserva- 
tives of genuine Christianity? Are the notions we may 
have indulged of their excellence and sanctity, altoge- 
ther confirmed by our researches among the ecclesiasti- 
cal remains of the times of Gregory I. and Mahomet? 
What has become of common sense, to say nothing of 
philosophy, if we are not, on the contrary, to allow that 
the evidence of history frowns altogether upon these 
false and pernicious doctrines, and declares that, to ex- 
alt the ritual and ecclesiastical elements of religion, into 



366 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

a position of equality with the spiritual, is a course more 
certa^inly fatal to Christian principles than that of pro- 
pagating even impious heresies. 

It is, besides, a task of no difficulty to show that, al- 
though Nicene Christianity, and the popery of the 
middle ages, differ in various incidental points, the for- 
mer passed into the latter in the course of an easy and 
inevitable transition; and moreover, that, in respect of 
apostolic Christianity, the one was to the full as fatally de- 
lusive as the other; while as a practical system, or con- 
sistent scheme of ecclesiastical despotism, the latter might 
well be accepted in the place of the former. A careful 
comparison, article by article, of the two systems (if two) 
imbodied in the writings of Chrysostom and Bernard, 
respectively, would on the whole, such is my persuasion, 
leave an advantage on the side of that professed by the 
latter. 

Yet so complicated are all human affairs, especially 
such as are mixed up with matters of opinion, that in- 
ferences the most convincing, to plain understandings, 
drawn from the actual operation and issue of either a re- 
ligious or a political system, may easily be evaded. 
Putting such evasions however out of sight, I would ask 
unprejudiced persons, whether the religious history (if 
we ought to call it a religious history) of Europe, eastern 
and western, from the fifth century downward, to the 
fifteenth, ought to be admitted as recommendatory, or as 
condemnatory of the Nicene church principles? In other 
words, does the actual result of the experiment which 
was made on so extensive a scale, and under such a di- 
versity of circumstances, for proving that Christianity 
is best promoted by enhancing its ritual and ecclesiasti- 
cal elements'— does this result justify or discourage our 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 367 

attempting to repeat it? Is it, let us candidly be told, is 
it with a fair and well-omened promise of a happy issue, 
that now again, we are to set about the work so zealous- 
ly urged forward by the Nicene doctors — I mean the 
work of magnifying the church, and its mysteries, and 
its ministers; while so much heart and labour only as 
could then be spared, is allowed to the endeavour to exalt 
the spiritual elements of religion? 

Against such an enterprise there stands opposed, first, 
the entire mass of all experience, as presented on the 
pages of history; and next, the whole force of the best a 
priori calculation we can make of the tendencies of hu- 
man nature, v/hen two such elements are offered, on any 
thing like even terms, to its choice. But more than all, 
we are, or we should think ourselves, prohibited from so 
rash an attempt by the manifest intention of the apos- 
tolic writings, in this very behalf, and by the explicit 
predictions they contain of the very corruptions which 
thence have arisen. 

If then it be proposed to us to set about reviving what 
are called "church doctrines," our reply might be — 
either, that the whole tenor of church history discourages 
such an endeavour: — or, that the dictates of common 
sense and sound philosophy declare against it; or that 
the spirit and letter of scripture are opposed to it. But 
now it may be said, and as waiving any such conclusions. 
Is it not possible that, as in one age church principles, 
relatively, may have been lifted to too high a level, 
so in another, and in our own, for instance, they 
may have been depressed below, or far below, the 
line which marks their due place in the religious sys- 
tem? — what then should be done? are we not to en- 
deavour to remedy this admitted evil; and must we not, 
in such a case, ought we not, to use all means for re- 



368 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

Storing what has so fallen out of its place? Yes; but by 
what means, or in what order of proceeding are we to 
make the attempt? Plainly, by endeavouring to invigo- 
rate anew the spiritual forces of piety, and then it will 
be easy enough, under a wise management, to restore 
the ritual elements: nothing is in fact more easy, when 
once men are thoroughly awakened to a sense of the in- 
finite importance and excellence of the great realities of 
the gospel, and when such an awakening spreads through^ 
a community — nothing is more easy than, at such a time,- 
to secure their reverent regard to, and diligent atten- 
dance upon, the exterior means and observances of reli-- 
gion. It is in this direction only, that what we profess- 
to be aiming at, can actually be reached. Nothing is- 
more insane — strictly nothing more preposterous, than^ 
the endeavour to work upward, in any case, from the 
ritual to the spiritual, in religion. 

Look at these two methods as we may imagine them 
to have .been exemplified in the instance which we have 
just now had before us, of the church at Antioch. Chry- 
sostom bitterly lamented the general indifference of the 
people of his charge in matters of religion, and especial- 
ly their contempt of the Lord's supper. Now, with 
the hope of effecting a reform in this single particular, 
two courses were fairly open before him; the one was 
that which he actually adopted, namely, the giving the 
reins to extravagance in speaking of the rite, and the 
pouring forth torrents of bombast on the subject, telling 
the people generally that the eucharist and baptism were 
the main instruments of salvation, and assuring them, 
as to the former, that cherubim and seraphim hovered- 
trembling over the altar, veiling their faces, lest they 
should catch a glimpse of tlie consecrated elements; and' 
moreover, adding the impious nonsense, that these eie- 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 369 

ments had the miraculous property of melting away into 
the animal system; and that they never took the course 
of ordinary aliment! 

This was one method of bringing the people back to 
a reverent attendance upon the rites of the church; and 
it was the method chosen and practised by Chrysostom 
and his contemporaries. But there is another method 
(oh that it had been once tried!) namely, that of zeal- 
ously and affectionately opening up to the people the 
evil mysteries of their own hearts — convincing them of 
their sin, danger, and helplessness — speaking to them 
warmly and solemnly of the sacred influence which 
overcomes every obstacle in the way of man's salvation, 
and of the power and grace of Him by whom that salva- 
tion has been obtained. This is another method, tend- 
ing not less certainly (far more so) toward the object at 
first proposed, namely, that of leading the people on to 
a reverent and profitable attendance upon the external 
means of grace. But such was not the method taken, 
or ever thought of, so far as we can learn, by the Ni- 
eene divines. Yet can we ourselves hesitate in making 
our choice between the two? 

I must then take the liberty plainly to express the opi- 
nion, that the Oxford Tract writers, religiously desirous 
as no doubt they are, to correct what they feel to be the 
excesses of protestantism, and to renovate church au- 
thority, to enhance sacramental reverence, and to deepen 
ritual solemnity, show themselves to be by no means 
wise master builders, by commencing their labours, as 
they do, at what we must think, the wrong end; and by 
persisting to carry them on in the WTong direction. In 
that direction in which they are toiling so hard, even 
their immediate object is not to be attained. A people 

may indeed, by such perilous tampering, be led on^ anil 

32 



S70 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

beguiled, into the swarYnps of an abject superstition; but 
a genuine and reverent regard to religious rites and ordi- 
nances, will be the result of nothing but an invigorated 
promulgation of a pure, apostolic gospel. 

It is surely for the sake of that gospel — for the sake of 
the spiritual realiiies of Christianity, and not for the 
mere sake of the ritual and ecclesiastical elements them- 
selves, that these zealous, devout, and learned men are 
stirring so deeply the clerical and public mind, at the 
present moment. So far, they, and those who may op- 
pose their endeavours, might seem to be fully agreed; 
and then the controversy would appear to relate merely 
to the means fittest to be used, or to the course of pro- 
ceeding which might be thought the best for securing 
the object aimed at by all parties. But such is far from 
being the real quality of the controversy; for, by the 
opponents of the Oxford writers, it is alleged, and on no 
narrow grounds of experience, that, to prosecute this 
ultimate object in the mode adopted by the early (ftiurch, 
and carried on by the church of Rome, and now again 
so earnestly recommended by the Oxford divines, is not 
simply (which we might excuse) to take a longer, in- 
stead of a shorter course, but to take a course which, as 
to the mass of the people, leads to an abyss whence 
there is no return! From that treacherous border the 
few would make their escape, heavenward; as the few, 
in every age, have es^iaped from the false bosom of the 
Eomish church; but the many — the thousands of the 
people, would become the pitiable victims of this reli- 
gion of sacraments. 

It would be a delusion as gross as this ancient delu- 
sion itself, to imagine that a refined and spiritualized 
Nicene Christianity, such a system as is now issuing 
from the cloisters of Oxford, would prove itself materi- 



1 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 371 

ally a better scheme than was its original, or than was 
the papal church; or that it would not lead on to the 
same spiritual debauchery and tyranny. The principle 
is one and the same, and it is a principle with which 
neither the gospel nor the well-being of society will ever 
consist. If, in fact, this newly refined gnosticism should 
retain the highly wrought polish imparted to it by its 
modern originators, it would be only so much the more 
dangerous; inasmuch as it would captivate more minds, 
and be itself less open to assault. But it would 7iot re- 
tain its first refinement— no, not through the lifetime of 
the next series of its adherents: the tendencies of human 
nature are powerful as a deluge, headed up for awhile; 
and they will take their constant course. The very 
youths who, at this moment, are being lulled by the poi- 
sonous atmosphere of the Nicene levels, will, twenty 
years hence, or sooner, interpret the doctrine they are 
receiving in a new, and a more intelligible, and practi- 
cal, and consistent sense; and, in fact, while they will 
teach the vulgar to revere their deceased masters, they 
will, themselves, and in private, Scorn their memory as 
scrupulous devotees, and mock the recollection of their 
devout sincerity. That shall happen to them — the Ox- 
ford wortliies of our times, which has happened to the 
saints of Rome — to be worshipped by the rabble, and 
spit upon by the priests. ' The plague, not otherwise 
stayed, a very few years would be enough for bringing 
back upon England, not merely the mummeries always 
attendant upon a religion of sacraments, nor merely the 
filth and folly, the lies and woes of the ancient monkery, 
but the palpable and terrible cruelties of the times of St. 
Dominic, of Ximenes, and of Bonner. If there are those 
who will scout any such anticipation, as a mere contro- 
versial flourish, or rhetorical extravagrance, or as a dis- 



372 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

ingenuous endeavour, on the part of a writer, to enlist 
popular fears and vulgar prejudices on his side, let thern 
read again the history of Europe, and of the church, 
from the second century downwards, and gather thence 
what hitherto must have escaped them — the first princi- 
ples of human nature, and of the social system as de- 
veloped by religious motives. Of this history hitherto 
we have, on all sides, known far too little. 

I cannot conclude this tract without repeating the pro- 
fession I have already made, of an entire exemption 
from every acrimonious, or disrespectful feeling towards 
the eminent persons whose public conduct, as divines, I 
am compelled to speak of in terms of the strongest re- 
probation. No one who is accustomed to think of Atha- 
nasius, Chrysostom, Basil, and Ambrose, and others of 
that age, as devout ^nd upright men, or to peruse the 
works of the Romanist writers, with pleasure and defe- 
rence (reserving always an opinion of their Christianity) 
can feel it to be difficult to entertain sentiments of re- 
spect and esteem towards men who are not inferior, pro- 
bably, to any of the best of the latter class, and who, 
without a doubt, are far more enlightened, as Chris- 
tians, than were any of the former. 



It remains, then, and it is a task which may be ac- 
complished within the limits of the next number, to ex- 
hibit the bearing of the principle and practice of religious 
tfelibacy upon the ethical system, and the actual morals 
of the ancient church — upon its ritual institutions, and 
upon its ecclesiastical, or hierarchical constitutions. We 
shall then be in a position, or, at least, so far as so imper- 
fect a sketch of a very extensive field can put us in po- 
sition, for giving a reply to two questions, First, Whe- 
ther the celibate, and its attendant monkery, be really 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY, 373 

separable from the other elements of Nicene Christi- 
anity; and if not, then, Secondly, whether, after the sam- 
ple we shall have had of the former, we shall arccept and 
imitate the two, as one system; or whether we shall re- 
ject both together? 

In acquitting myself of that part of my task which 
yet lies before^ me, while it will be unavoidable to ad- 
duce, or to refer to, evidence such as one would have been 
glad to have left untouched, I shall also find a proper op- 
portunity, which, indeed, I am most anxious to meet 
with, for giving its due commendation to the ancient 
church; and, in fact, for righting a little the balance 
between ancient and modern Christianity. Truth, vir- 
tue, and piety, as a whole, have not been the monopoly 
of any one age, or communion: nor has any body of Chris- 
tians so far, or so completely, fallen from scriptural ex- 
cellence, as not to have retained some specific merits, as 
compared with other bodies. The ancient church, while 
fatally deluded, nevertheless might boast several such 
merits; and some, of a high order; and it will be to per- 
form at once, an edifying, a gratifying, and a consoling 
office, to bring these excellences forward, and to use 
them as a means of correcting our defective modern no- 
tions and practices. 

I feel perfectly certain that, among those who would 
the most decisively aad warmly resist the culpable en- 
deavour now making to foist Nicene Christianity into the 
room of the reformation, there are many who would 
gladly and meekly listen to any reasonable reproofs, or 
corrections, drawn from the example, the lives, or the 
teaching of the early Christians, and tending to supply 
what may be wanting in, or what may have dropped out 
of, our protestant principles or practices. When there- 

32* 



374 MEANS OF ESTIMATING THE 

fore occasions of this sort may present themselves, I 
shall readily embrace them, not at all fearing to offend 
well trained protestant ears. On the contrary, I am sure 
it will afford a cordial satisfaction to religious minds to 
find that the church has been the church — a body vivi* 
fied by virtue and piety, in every age: nor will this sa- 
tisfaction be at all spoiled, rather it will be made the 
more lively, when it happens that, from such compari- 
sons of age with age, a lesson of humiliation comes home 
to ourselves. There would, I am persuaded, be no ha- 
zard in engaging, on behalf of the sound protestant com- 
munity in this country^ that^ while it would reject with 
indignation the unwise endeavour now made to drive the 
€hurch back upon the foolish, flimsy, and pernicious 
church principles of the Nicene age, it would meekly 
submit itself to a correction, drawn from any bright ex- 
amples of self-denial, constancy, or devotedness, which 
that age may offer. 

We, I mean sound protestants, know what human 
nature is, and always remember that, while it has never 
been such as should make it a fit object of worship, it 
does not at any time stand excused from the duty of 
humbly comparing its rate of wisdom and goodness with 
that of other times. We, therefore, neither crouch 
before the doctors of the Nicene age, any more than we 
do before those of any other period; nor do we utterly 
condemn any set or community of our fallible predeces- 
sors and brethren. All such superstitions, and all such 
intolerance, we utterly disclaim, and leave both to Ro- 
manists, to whom, however, in their turn, we are per- 
fectly willing and ready to look for any patterns of ex- 
cellence, whether more or less complete, which they 
may have to produce. 

This is OUR catholicity, and this is our reverence for 



QUALITY OF THE NICENE THEOLOGY. 375 

venerable antiquity! We venerate antiquity, and we 
are curious to penetrate its secrets, because we firmly 
iDelieve that, in every age, God has had his people. We 
venerate antiquity, just as we venerate any, even the 
most despised community of modern Christians, who 
appear, in any degree, to enjoy the presence and influx 
ence of the Holy Spirit; and who, as it may seem, along 
with many and deplorable errors, yet " love the Lord 
Jesus Christ in sincerity." 

We, too, heartily make profession of our belief in the 
^* Holy Catholic Church;" and after having made this 
profession, and after having attached an intelligible and 
most comfortable meaning to the words^—venerable words 
as they are, we should shudder as much at the cold im- 
piety of excluding from its pale the deluded genuine 
Christians of the Nicene, or Romish churches, as the de- 
luded (if they be deluded) genuine Christians of some 
avoided and abhorred sect of our own times. This is 
OUR catholicity; and it fills our hearts with comfort and 
our mouths with praise: it brightens the sadness, and 
composes the distractions of earth; and it brings into our 
bosoms something of the genial emotions which, we be- 
lieve, will make up the felicity of the *' communion of 
saints" in heaven. 

Whetlier we shall find in heaven ** all the saints" of 
the calendar, we do not well know; but we do know that 
we shall meet there '' a great multitude," of those whom 
the intolerant have wished in perdition, or have sent into 
the skies through flames, and from racks and gibbets; — 
and we would almost as soon lend a hand, in this work, 
to a Bonner, as admit to our creed or bosom, any notion 
or feeling, the efl^ct of w^hich would be to alienate us, 
even in thought, from any whom there we shall meet. 

This is our catholicity; nor does it take up a grain af 



376 MEANS OF ESTIMATING, (fec. 

that mingled indifference and infidelity which is called 
latitudinarianism. Tliis word, as we understand it, 
means what is equivalent to professing, either that nine- 
teen and twenty are absolutely equal; or that the differ- 
ence between the two sums is not worth regarding. But 
such a profession, when it attaches to matters of religion, 
is not a mere absurdity, but an impiety also; and it is a 
certain indication of such a coldness of heart as would 
lead a man to thrown up his interest in the nineteen parts 
of his faith, as easily as in the one. Now, far from 
sharing in either the absurdity, or the impiety, of a lati- 
tudinarian temper, we give a proof of how justly we es- 
timate the value of the nineteen elements, or points of 
religion, by recognising their aggregate worth, even when 
the one may be wanting. 

But now we find fault with the catholicity that attends 
" church principles," on tliis very account, that it drives 
men into at once the absurdity, and the impiety, of 
making as much ado about the one, as about the nine- 
teen parts of their Christianity; or even to attach more 
practical importance to the one, than they do to the nine- 
teen. While the latitudinarian slights the circumstan- 
tials of religion, because he inwardly cares little or no- 
thing about its substance, the zealot of " church princi- 
ples," by magnifying enormously the importance of its 
circumstantials, puts a real contempt upon the substance; 
and he does so, probably, under the influence of the very 
same feeling of secret disaffection to that substance. 

On the contrary, the catjiolicity which we profess, 
gives the most convincing proof possible of its remote- 
ness from latitudinarian indifference, or chilliness of 
heart, by opening its arms to all who can furnish any 
credible evidence of their possessing that substance. — 
Who is it then that steers the farthest from infidelity — he 



THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, &C. 3T7 

v^ho will never acknowledge Christianity at all, except 
when it meets him trimly aitired in the court livery he 
is fond of? or he who heartily welcomes it, even when 
he may much dislike the garb which, in any instance, it 
happens to wear? 



THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, AS LAID 
DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 

No difficulty attaches to the subject of religious celt- 
bacy if we confine ourselves to what is said concerning 
it by our Lord, and the apostles; nor can even the most 
fervent-minded Christians be in danger of running into 
extravagance on this ground, so long as the great prin- 
xjiples of the gospel are understood, and their genuine 
influence is admitted. But the moment when these 
principles are compromised, and when the humble and 
happy path of faith and true holiness is abandoned, and 
a factitious pietism is courted, then fervour becomes en- 
thusiasm, and every folly and enormity of the ascetic 
life follows in rapid succession. 

Thus it was with the ancient asceticism; nor with this 
error alone; and it is a singular circumstance that so 
close an analogy subsists between the two subjects of 
celibacy and martyrdom, as well in regard to the rule 
laid down for each by our Lord and the apostles, as to 
the fatal misunderstanding of that rule by the ancient 
church, that if any ambiguity may be thought to em- 
barrass the one of these subjects, it may readily be 
M^leared up by a direct analogical argument, derived from 
4he other. The fact is really curious, as well as impor- 



378 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

tant ill a practical view, lliat, from the moment when 
the church was left to its own discretion, it went astray, 
or, as we might say, ran wild, on both these parallel 
lines; so that if we were balancing in regard to the one, 
and doubting whether, after all, the practice of antiquity 
was not substantially apostolic, we no sooner turn to 
the other, than we perceive the not-to-be-misunderstood 
indications, of sheer enthusiasm, and of an almost total 
want of sound evangelic feeling. 

If at any time one were yielding oneself to the natu- 
ral and agreeable illusion of supposing that the early 
church enjoyed a continuity of that miraculous influence 
which preserved the inspired men from the follies and 
errors that are incident to humanity, and which are so 
abundantly generated by religious excitements — if one 
were thinking this to have been the fact, the dream is 
instantly dispelled by merely looking into the ancient 
martyrologies. Affecting and admirable as are many of 
these memorials of Christian fortitude, we instantly feel 
that, when compared with the temper, principles, and 
style of the inspired persons, a something essential is 
wanting, and that a something fatal has come in its place. 
We are breathing another atmosphere, and another co- 
lour is spread over all objects. These good men, the 
early martyrs, spoke, acted, and suffered nobly; and we 
love and admire them; and we also find it easy to follow, 
in their case, those workings of human nature which, 
under trials so severe and unusual, hurried them far be- 
yond the modest line of evangelical simplicity. We are 
not now intending to deal rigorously with these wor- 
thies; but are simply noticing the fact that they did so 
act as men are likely to do, who are not benefited, more 
than we ourselves may be, by supernatural aids. 

This is not the place for entering into argument with 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 379 

any (a hopeless task in truth) who miglit profess to 
think the early nniartyrologies, and the florid repetitions 
of them by the Nicene orators, to be altogether in the 
style and temper of the New Testament. I assmr.e, on 
the contrary, that the marked difference is perceived, 
and fully admitted, by all candid persons. But then, if 
there be such a diflerence, it involves the fact that the 
ancient church had lost its hold of evangelic simplicity 
in regard to the rule, and the motives of martyrdom; 
and then there can be no ground on which to resist the 
evidence which attests its having also, and as early, fal- 
len into an error in relation to celibacy, which error was 
only another consequence of the same departure from 
apostolic doctrine. 

The rule of martyrdom may be stated to this eiTect. — 
The Lord demands of every one who would not be de- 
nied by him at the last, that he shall be willing rather 
to suffer the loss of all things, and of life itself, than 
deny him before men. This flrst stipulation of our 
Christian profession, is absolute, and clear, and of per- 
manent obligation; and if any cases arise in which it may 
be doubtful what "denying Christ" means; as when 
Christians have been required, by a usurping church, to 
violate their consciences in relatio?i to points not of su- 
preme importance, then the ambiguous case falls under 
a broader rule, namely, that of suffering any extremity 
sooner than defile the lips by an insincere profession, 
especially if that profession have a bearing upon reli- 
gion; for a prevarication of this sort, whatever may hap- 
pen to be the immediate subject of it, is a " lying unto 
God," and carries a peculiar turpitude. 

But then, while this serious duty is peremptory, and 
of universal application, not less so is the })recept that 
the Christian is, in all cases, to withdraw himself from 



380 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

SO terrible an alternative, if he may do it either by fliglit^. 
or by availing himself of any civil privilege, or forensic 
plea, which, if equitably interpreted, would screen him 
from the rage of his persecutors. The apostles, in their 
own conduct, exemplified both parts of this injunction. 
Peter, indeed, once forgot the first: Paul, again and 
again, acted upon the second. 

But then a passage or two occurs in which something 
beyond this strict rule is held before those who should 
actually be called, in compliance with it, to suffer loss, 
and to bleed for the sake of Christ. — There is, as it ap- 
pears, a gracious reward, and an emjfience of happiness, 
to be conferred, by sovereign goodness, upon sufferers 
for truth. By these promises genuine sufferers for 
Christ's sake have in every age been wont to sustain 
their fortitude; and just so long as the great evangelic 
principle of piety is adhered to, and its humbling influ- 
ence felt, all is safe: the due counterpoise of motive is 
preserved, and while the heart-cheering hope of a '* bet- 
ter resurrection" is admitted, enthusiasm, self-righteous- 
ness and presumption are avoided. It is thus, in fact,, 
that we find the martyrs of the reformation, generally to 
have suffered and died. The gospel, which had then 
just been recovered, and which was entertained in its 
energy and beauty, carried these worthies, unhurt, not 
merely through the ordeal of torture and a fiery death, 
but safe through the far more difficult trial of high reli- 
gious excitement. In thousands of instances the vic- 
tims of papal ferocity have died, not only joyfully, and 
resolutely; but what is more — meekly and humbly. 

Why did not the age of protestant suflering (rare and 
discouraged instances excepted) why did it not produce 
iis bands of insolent confessors, its knights spiritual, 
stalking in and out of the church, as a privileged class, 



r 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. S81 

rich in supererogatory merit, and as such entitled to the 
honour of violating all church order? Why have not 
our protestant preachers been used to spend their choi- 
cest rhetoric upon the commemorations of the martyrs 
of protestantism? Why is it that a very little of this 
sort of declamation has been felt to be more than enough? 
Why have we seen no pilgrimages to the spots where 
our English worthies suffered? Why have we not been 
used to entreat, for ourselves and the church, the all- 
prevailing advocacy (patrocinium) of Latimer, and Rid- 
ley, and Hooper, in the heavens? Why have no mira- 
cles been wrought by their rescued finger-bones or teeth? 
Why do not our churches boast of bottles of the blood, 
and locks of the hair of our martyrs? No such things 
have been done, or tolerated, in the protestant church, 
simply because the protestant church has understood 
something of the first principles of Christianity, and 
has, in the main, been not merely orthodox, but evan^ 
gelic; and has, therefore, abhorred the practices, and 
scorned the sentiments, which were in universal esteem 
in the Nicene church. 

It cannot be necessary in this place to describe what 
has so often found a place in modern church historiesy 
namely — first the enthusiasm, then the fanaticism, and 
then the unbounded superstitions which were connected 
with, and which utterly spoiled the otherwise, noble 
constancy of the ancient church. To say all in a word, 
the sufierings of the second and third centuries, became 
the curse and ruin of the fourth and fifth; and so it was 
that the Enemy, who had altogether been foiled in hi& 
rage, triumphed in his craft. 

But what is to be especially observed is this, that all 

the enthusiasm, and all the fanaticism of the early mar-^ 

tyrdoms, and much of the superstition which thence 

33 



382 THE RULE OF RKLIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

took its occasion, sprung directly from certain abused 
passages of scripture, and that the illusion sustained 
itself by quoting text upon text; nevertheless not until 
after the genuine principles of Christianity had been 
compromised. Now this is precisely the case with the 
parallel enthusiasm, fanaticism, and superstition, of the 
ancient celibacy — all was justified by scripture — llie 
gospel having first been discharged from its place in the 
minds of the people, and their teachers. 

It is even now asked by some, did not the ascetic sys- 
tem support itself by an appeal to scripture? Yes, and 
so has every superstition of the papacy, and so did the 
enormities of the Donatists, and so the atrocities of the 
fanatics of Munster; so the lawless bloodshed and cruelty 
of the crusades, so the horrors of the inquisition, and 
so (to return to our point) the enthusiasm of martyrdom. 
But, in all such cases, how specious soever may be the 
plea of the deluded party, a simple course, clearing 
every difiBculty, is open to us — Let but the great princi- 
ples of the gospel be restored to their place in the heads 
•and hearts of Christians, and then the practical misinter- 
pretation of single texts is at once obviated; for, not 
merely are such misinterpretations then seen to be op- 
posed to the spirit and tendency of the New Testament, 
but, as they severally spring from modes of feeling which 
will not consist with a genuine evangelic feeling, they, 
in fact, find no place, where better motives are in vigour. 
A man, whose mind is fraught with apostolic sentiments, 
will neither adore a relic, nor worship the image of a 
saint, nor pray to the Virgin^ nor burn a heretic, nor offer 
himself to be burned, nor drive spikes into his sides, nor, 
if he be unmarried, will he call himself, or allow him- 
self to be called a terrestrial seraph. All these follies 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 383 

and enormities, wliether sustained by many texts, or by 
few, belong to darkened souls, and to a dark age. 

The rule of religious celibacy, as found in the New 
Testament, is, in fact, much more clearly defined than 
are some other things which have become the occasion 
of serious errors. Three or four passages comprise all 
that is said on the subject by our Lord, or the apostles: 
and, happily, if any ambiguity might seem to attach ta 
the letter of the rule, we may derive from our Lord's 
personal behaviour, and from the practice of the apos- 
tles, such a comment upon it as must be amply sufficient 
for removing every doubt; at least, if our own minds be 
free from factitious excitements. 

It is a remarkable circumstance that, of the four prin- 
cipal passages,* relating to celibacy, in the New Testa- 
ment, namely, Matt. xix. 12, Luke xx. 35, 1 Cor. vii. 
and Rev. xiv. 4, that one is the most frequently referred 
to by the ascetic writers, and is made to bear the great- 
est stress, which, in fact, is wholly irrelevant to the 
subject — I mean our Lord's assertion concerning the 
angels, as reported by Luke. But it is not difficult to 
divine the motive of this absurd preference. Our Lord's 
doctrine of celibacy, as given by Matthew, carries with 
it a definite restriction, which pointedly condemned the 
general practice of the church, and especially its cruel 
usao^e of incitino^ children to devote themselves to a 
single life. Then, again, Paul's lengthened disquisition 
on the subject involves so many principles of practical 
wisdom, and so much cool good sense, as made it dan- 
gerous to insist very long, or minutely, upon the pas- 

* To these texts Cyprian, who musters forces on this point, 
adds, Gen. iiL 16, Exod. xix. 15, and 1 Kings xxi. 4. (Testim 
lib,iii. 32.) 



384 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

sage; and then, as to the phrase occurring in the Apo- 
calypse, besides that the book altogether was not uni- 
versally admitted as canonical by the early church, and 
is much less quoted by the ancient writers than other 
parts of the canon, the figurative, and, as it seems, the 
true interpretation of the passage, as intending the faith- 
ful worshippers of God, uncontaminated by idolatry, was 
not unknown to the early expositors. — See Origen, torn, 
iv. p. 3. 

But, if only the absurdity involved in any such ap- 
plication of our Lord's language- — Luke xx. 35 — could 
be got over, then it afforded precisely the kind of sup- 
port that was wanted in favour of the notion of a spi- 
ritual aristocracy, or class, answering to the gnostic 
7rvsv/!AiirriKoi, and to whom the epithet " terrestrial an- 
gels," or seraphs, might be applied. To obtain the aid 
of this passage, reasoning such as this was to be resort- 
ed to — The "marrying, and the being given in mar- 
riage," is the condition of our present mode of exist- 
ence: but it is not the condition of the future life; there- 
fore — how sound the inference! those who, although 
actually belonging to this world, and not to the next, 
choose to renounce marriage, become, in doing so, an- 
gels, and are at once " children of the resurrection." 
As if we were to say — animal life is sustained by ali- 
ment; not so the angelic life; therefore^ to abstain from 
food, so far as possible, is, in the same degree, to make 
oneself an angel! Illusions so gross as these could ne- 
ver have overcome the good sense of the early church, 
if the broad road of unbounded absurdity had not first 
been opened before it by the gnostic heresies. 

Our Lord's intention, in this instance, can hardly be 
misunderstood; for, while his main purpose was to re- 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 385 

fute the saddiicee, whose doctrine strikes at the very root 
of religion, he took the occasion, also, to reprobate those 
gross conceptions of the future life, then current among 
the Jewish people, whence alone the hypothetical ob- 
jection propounded to him could draw any force. *' Your 
dilemma supposes that there will be marrying and giving 
in marriage, in heaven: absurd and grovelling thought! 
know that the heavenly society is constituted on another 
principle: what becomes then of your assumed diffi- 
culty? The children of the resurrection shall be as the 
angels." 

So much for a passage of which more use was made 
than of any other, in recommending the practice of reli- 
gious celibacy! Precisely in the same style of unscru- 
pulous logic, were the sanguinary measures of the pa- 
pacy excused and recommended — " Compel them to 
come in " — " I am not come to send peace on the earth, 
but a sword" — "it is better that one member perish," 
(that one heretic, or a thousand, be burned,) " than that 
the whole body " (the church) be lost or damaged. Per- 
haps the surest indication, in the case either of an indi- 
A'idual or a community, of abandonment to delusion, is 
that of the habit of perversely interpreting single phrases, 
or insulated passages of scripture, in open contempt of 
its spirit and tendency. This practice, of which the 
pattern was set by Satan himself, has been the constant 
characteristic of those who have appeared to be " led 
captive by him at his will." In its entire ascetic doc- 
trine, as well as in many other important points, one 
can hardly think any thing else than that the Nicene 
church had yielded itself to a strong delusion, and was 
given over to believe a lie. 

Our Lord's direct affirmation, and his implied doc- 

33* 



386 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

trine, as stated. Matt. xix. 12, does really bear upon the 
question of religious celibacy, and it therefore demands 
to be seriously considered. The Jewish national belief 
and feeling on the subject of marriage, which that people 
considered as a positive and universal duty, required, like 
some other national prejudices, to be loosened and cor- 
rected, in order to make room for a higher, and a more 
comprehensive religious system. Our Lord surely did 
not intend to condemn or disparage personal cleanliness 
when he affirmed that, " to eat with unwashen hands 
defileth not a man." What he meant was, to bring in 
a spiritual and genuine notion of purity, in the place of 
the national and rabbinical superstition of the Jews, He 
did not mean either to condemn, or to abrogate the wor- 
ship of God in the Jewish temple, when he affirmed that 
the time was come for establishing the worship of God 
on a broader and more spiritual basis than that of the 
Mosaic institute. Nor does he, as we may confidently 
assume, in the present instance, intend, either to throw 
discredit upon matrimony, (which, here and elsewhere, 
he honours by a solemn sanction,) nor to speak of celi- 
bacy as if it were a holier and loftier condition; for, to 
have done this would have been to have recognised that 
very principle of exterior and ceremonial purity, against 
which he so strenuously, we might say vehemently, in- 
veighed, on various occasions. Although, in this parti- 
cular point, the national prejudice of the Jews stood op- 
posed to the ascetic doctrine, yet the general principle 
of sanctity, as attaching to visible observances, and of a 
merit, as belonging to classes of men, on the ground of 
peculiar abstinences, w^as altogether agreeable to the na- 
tural mind, and would have been readily listened to by 
the pharisees. 

Our Lord seems to have intended, after condemning 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 387 

the lax and flagitious practice of divorce, as then preva- 
lent among the Jews, and, after giving the most empha- 
tic sanction to the institution of marriage, to take the oc- 
casion, suggested by the query of the disciples — ''At 
that rate is it good to marry?" for introducing a higher 
motive of conduct, belonging to the "kingdom of hea- 
ven," and v/hich, in opposition to the Jewish opinion 
and custom, might lead certain individuals (who are so 
described as to preclude a fanatical misinterpretation of 
the rule) to separate themselves even from the lawful 
engagements of ordinary life, and so the better to pro- 
mote this kingdom, in an evil world, unencumbered by 
any earthly ties. The sovereign motives of the new 
dispensation were of such force, that they might lead a 
man even to lay down life itself for Christ, or to sur- 
render property, and every social endearment; and, as a 
circumstance attending this sort of unsparing devoted- 
ness, an abstinence from marriage might be not only a 
lawful, but an acceptable sacrifice. " Ye are not your 
own, but are bought with a price," — "glorify God there- 
fore with your bodies, and with your spirits, which are 
his," — " present your bodies, a living sacrifice unto 
God," &c. These several injunctions, being only va- 
rious consequences, all flowing from the one supreme 
reason and motive which the gospel introduces, practi- 
cally amount to this — be ready to die, be ready to sufl^er, 
be ready to labour, be content, whether full or empty, as 
to earthly enjoyments; and, in a word, hold every thing 
in subordination to the one principle of Christian con- 
duct; or, to say all at once — " let the same mind be in 
you which was in Christ Jesus, who pleased not him- 
self." This sovereign rule of behaviour may make a 
man a martyr, or may induce him to lead a single life, 
or may impel him to traverse the globe, having no cer- 



388 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

tain dwelling-place — when the doing so shall clearly, 
and, in the judgment of good sense, tend to promote 
truth in the world. But, on the contrary, the enthusiast, 
or the fanatic, who, for the mere purpose — a selfish pur- 
pose — of snatching the martyr's crown, insults a perse- 
cuting power; or the ascetic, who, to no imaginable good 
purpose, inflicts torture upon himself, or passes his 
years, like a wild beast, in a cavern, or who adheres to 
celibacy as if it were an angelic excellence, and, in doing 
so, puts contempt upon the divine appointment — all such 
persons, puffed up by the self-idolizing conceits of an 
inflamed imagination, and of spiritual arrogance, wholly 
misunderstood the rule (as they are plainly destitute of 
the principle) of Christian self-denial. The course pur- 
sued under any such false impulses has, in fact, always 
diverged so widely from the line of Christian simplicity, 
humility, and benevolence, as to make evident enough 
the originating error whence it resulted. 

In our Lord's rule, above referred to, there are very 
distinctly to be observed, Jirst, the well-defined and se- 
riously propounded restriction — *' All are not able to re- 
ceive this word — i/'any man is able to receive it— z/", to 
any this ability has been given, let siich receive it;" 
plainly pointing to a peculiarity of original temperament, 
such as that, having been well ascertained by the indivi- 
dual, he might act upon it without peril or presumption. 
How frightfully and cruelly was this restriction contemn- 
ed by the Nicene writers and preachers, who not only so 
lauded t!ie merits and honours of virginity as in fact to 
seduce multitudes — tens of thousands, into a snare fatal 
to their present happiness and to their souls, but more- 
over, laboured with the utmost intensity to promote the 
flagitious practice of dedication to Christ (miserable 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 389 

misnomer) before the age ofpuperty^ nay, from infancy! 
This practice was the foul stain of the Nicene church. 
Even with our Lord's significant caution on their lips, 
we find the great writers of that infatuated age provoking 
the fanaticism of parents, and aiding to drive troops of 
helpless children and youths onward toward the preci- 
pice, and into that fiery abyss the horrors of which 
themselves have described!* 

But in the second place, our Lord's rule points dis- 
tinctly to a motive, which, after the restriction had been 
duly regarded, might justify this unusual course of life: 
— it was for the sake "of the kingdom of heaven," a 
phrase the meaning of which is put beyond doubt by a 
comparison of the places where it occurs, and by a con- 
sideration of the actual instances wherein its meaning 
was confessedly carried out into practice. Now if we 
compare this condition of the rule of celibacy with the 
ascetic institute, how was it set at naught! Let us ad- 
mit the most favourable supposition possible, namely, 
that the ascetics were, in the largemajority of instances, 
the most devoted and spiritually minded members of the 
Christian commonwealth; then, instead of seeking to 
promote " the kingdom of heaven," by remaining in the 
midst of the mass, as a conservative element, and in- 

*I have already, p. 230, referred to Gregory Nyssen and Au- 
gustine, on this point; and of the style in which this practice was 
urged, a favourable specimen may be found in Chrysostom's third 
book, addressed to the opponents of the monastic life, tom. i. p. 
92, et seq. It appears both from Chrysostom and Basil, that chil- 
dren were received into the religious houses, and there trained in 
the ascetic discipline until their deliberate choice could be ascer- 
tained. Basil, Reg. Fusios. Inter, xv. But this education, if it 
disgusted many, must have availed with too many in inducing 
them rashly to profess, long before they could know what they 
were doing. 



390 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

stead of endeavouring to shed a holy influence upon the 
dark world around them, they either shut themselves up 
in religious houses, located, most often, in the wilder- 
ness, or they absolutely secluded themselves from all 
human society, passing long years in the crevices of the 
mountains. That is to say, they acted upon a principle 
of unmixed and avowed selfishness^ and in direct contra- 
riety to the spirit and precepts of the gospel; and where- 
as Clirist had set an example to his followers, in not 
pleasing himself, and in "going about doing good," and 
in *' consorting with publicans and sinners," for their 
good — '' for the kingdom of heaven's sake," these as- 
cetics, minding only *' their own things," left the church 
and the world to take their course. And all this fla- 
grant contradiction of the spirit and letter of Christiani- 
ty received the admiring approval of every one of the 
great Nicene writers. 

In the third place, a material circumstance, in this in- 
stance, is the absolute want, in our Lord's language, of 
any implication, ever so remote, of the great ascetic doc- 
trine — the spirit of the whole system, namely, that of 
the intrinsic holiness and angelic merit of virginity. No 
alliance whatever has our Lord's practical recommenda- 
tion with the gnostic-Nicene principle, that marriage is 
a pollution, and celibacy a '' holy state," and a condi- 
tion of proximity to God. If any such notion had been 
in our Lord's view, was not this the place to have let it 
appear? With the ascetics, if indeed any regard was 
had to the possible utility of a single life, that is to say, 
its public utility, yet the all in all in their view was — 
the sanctity of the state, and its spiritual, or rather ce- 
lestial eminence. 

In each of these respects, then, the Nicene ascetic iu- 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 391 

siitute was a flagrant contempt of our Lord's rule of 
Christian celibacy: that is to say, first, as it wholly 
overlooked the restriction with which he had guarded it; 
secondly, as putting contempt upon the motive which 
might justify the celibacy of the few to whom it would 
be proper; and thirdly, as bringing in, and putting fore- 
most, a motive or doctrine not merely foreign to Chris- 
tianity, but subversive of its very purport. 

The interpretation we should give of our Lord's rule, 
may, however, be brought to a very satisfactory test, 
that I mean of his personal and immaculate behaviour 
(as well as the conduct of the apostles) and this beha- 
viour contrasted with the established usages of the as- 
cetic life, looked at in parallel circumstances. Be it re- 
membered then that, whereas among the Jews, the mo- 
ral dignity of woman, and the religious equality of the 
sexes, had been far better understood than among any 
other people of antiquity, even the most refined, and 
whereas rational and purifying domestic habits, allowing 
to woman her due place in society, were still in exis- 
tence in Palestine, our Lord, in his personal behaviour, 
and in a most remarkable manner, recognised this na- 
tional feeling, and allowed himself to be attended, and 
*' ministered to," by women,* and thus practically re- 
cognised, as good and safe, that intercourse of the sexes, 
in domestic and common life, which then prevailed. 
The first disciples, and the apostles, instead of drawing 
back from this wonted liberty, held to, and sanctioned 
it;t and in fact, it has been the glory of Christianity, 
wherever it has not been overpowered by the gnostic 
poison, to have wrought the regeneration of the social 

* Luke viii. 1 — 3, and Matt, xxvii. 55. 
t Acts i. 14. Phil. iv. 3. 



392 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

economy, precisely in this way, that is to say, by raising 
woman to her moral level, and by refining and sanction- 
ing the home intercourse of the sexes. How deep and 
fatal was the injury, in this particular, done to the world 
by the ancient asceticism, and to what extent it operated 
to debauch the social system, we shall have to state by 
and by. At present, let us contemplate the edifying con- 
trast of our blessed Lord's behaviour, as compared with 
that of the heroes of gnostic sanctity — the Nicene saints. 
Our Lord was in some instances attended in his jour- 
neys by women, his wants being provided for by their 
generous attachment, and his personal comfort secured 
by their assiduous affection. But now no injunctions of 
the ascetic institute are more frequent or serious than 
those which interdict all intercourse between the sexes. 
To frequent the society of women, to converse with 
them, to lift the eye from the earth where they were pre- 
sent, was an offence, or at least an extreme imprudence. 
The places are innumerable in which cautions of this 
sort occur: — the touch of a female hand, what contami- 
nation did it convey!* It may be well, while our blessed 

^ If the extravagances of inferior writers were here cited, an 
objection would be raised, as if an unfair advantage were taken 
of the folly of individuals. I will refer therefore to none but the 
highest authorities. Among these none is of higher reputation 
than Basil, and the reader may, at the cost of an hour's reading, 
form his own opinion of the Nicene monkery as to its principles 
and rules, in examining the ascetic tracts of this father; 1 mean 
especially his replies to the queries of the monks, and his Mo- 
nastic Constitutions, to which I shall make some particular re- 
ferences in the following sections. Ephrem also, and Cassian, 
must be cited in proof of what is here only incidentally affirmed, 
namely, that the ascetic sanctity demanded restrictions, in per- 
sonal behaviour, which were never thought of by the apostles, 
whom we must believe to have been not less holy than th^se 
monks. 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 393^ 

Lord's conduct is vividly recollected, to take a single in- 
stance of a mode of behaviour, in one of the most pro- 
minent personages of the Nicene age, which imbodies 
the admitted principles of Nicene feeling and morality, 
both as to clerical pretensions, and to ascetic purity. 
When we see a ''successor of the apostles," in the 
fourth century, admitting an adulation and a personal 
worship which the apostles themselves would not have 
allowed — and at the same time pretending to a sanctity 
which the Son of God knew nothing of, we must either 
grant, what is now affirmed, by some, that the Christi- 
anity of the Nicene age was indeed a purer and a more 
finished form of our religion than that which Christ and 
the apostles were acquainted with; or else allow that the 
striking contrariety that distinguishes the two schemes 
of piety and manners, is that which properly character- 
ises, on the one side, true holiness, simplicity, and truth; 
and on the other, factitious sanctimoniousness, unbound- 
ed spiritual arrogance, and a falseness, which was the 
product either of delusion, or of knavery, or of both. 
Let the reader bear in mind those various incidents of 
the gospel narrative which exhibit our Lord's behaviour 
toward his female followers; and then turn to the life 
of Saint Martin of Tours, as reported by his admirer and 
disciple, Sulpitius Severus. (Sulpit. Sev. Dial. IL c. 5, 6.) 
This famous St. Martin, "justly compared with the 
apostles and prophets, whom in all things he resembled, 
in faith, virtue, and miraculous power," had occasion, 
soon after his consecration, to visit the imperial palace. 
Valentinian, knowing that he was come to ask for that 
which he did not wish to grant, ordered him to be dri- 
ven from the gate — instigated to this irreverence by his 
wife. The insulted bishop forthwith had recourse tc^ 

34 



394 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

the wonted aids of fasting, sackcloth, ashes, and prayers; 
and at the end of a week an angel appeared to him, 
commanding him to repeat his attempt to see the empe- 
ror, 'and assuring him that every obstacle should now give 
way before him. In fact, neither doors, nor guards, ob- 
structed his approach to the royal apartments. The 
emperor, however, enraged at his unbidden intrusion, 
does not deign to rise at his entrance (a reverence due 
by an emperor to a bishop) until the throne itself had 
burst out in flames — ipsumque regem ea parte corpo- 
ris, qua sedebat, adflaret incendium! The haughty 
prince, thus unwillingly driven from his seat, rose, to 
St. Martin; and moreover, being convinced and won by 
this same fervid logic, he granted all that was demanded; 
and from that time loaded St. Martin with honours. The 
mention of the palace, leads the narrator to introduce 
another incident, characteristic of his master's virtues 
and manners. The wife of the emperor Maximus was 
accustomed to listen with the utmost reverence to the 
conversation of the saint, and following the evangelic 
example, she washed his feet with her tears, and wiped 
them with her hair. Martin, whom never before a wo- 
man had touched, knew not how to escape from the as- 
siduous attentions, nay rather, the servile offices of the 
empress, who, in comparison with the honour of ren- 
dering such services to such a saint, held in contempt 
all princely pomps, power, and wealth. In the end she 
prepared his repast, waited upon him at table, and ga- 
thering the crumbs, esteemed them as more delicious 
than the dainties of a royal banquet. 

The narrator is however here stopped by his friend, 
with the startling inquiry. How it could be, that so emi- 
nent a saint, whose sacred person a female hand had 
never before contaminated, could admit so great a free- 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 395 

dom on the part of the empress: and he fears what may 
be the consequence, upon some minds, of such an in- 
stance of condescension. To this it is replied that the 
singularity of the occasion, and the saint's benevolent 
errand at that time, seemed sufficiently to justify his re- 
laxing a little the severity of his rule; and well were it 
for those who might be likely to make an improper use 
of his example, in this instance, if they could so con- 
sider it as to be confirmed in their adherence to the as- 
cetic discipline. Let such consider the case — once in 
his life only, and he already in his seventieth year, had 
any such thing happened! — Consider too, it was no wi- 
dow to whom he granted this indulgence, nor virgo las- 
civiens; but a wife, in the presence of her husband, and 
at his request; — an empress too, performing these of- 
fices: nor did even she dare to partake with him of his 
repast! Take the instance as it is — such an occasion- 
such a person, such a reverence, such a table — and in 
the whole course of life — once only! 

Now what is all this but insufferable spiritual prudery — 
arrogance — hypocrisy, or much worse? Yet it is the 
characteristic style of the Nicene age. The writer, 
Sulpitius, more than once impiously sets his saint by 
the side of Christ, as if the two characters might be 
compared on some ground of analogy; in fact, they 
stand in absolute contrast, and not to have seen and felt 
this contrariety, was itself an effect of that universal de- 
lusion and thick darkness, which had then surrounded 
the church. This however is manifest enough, that our 
Lord's rule of celibacy neither implied, nor resulted 
from, any such notion of sanctity as that which consti- 
tuted the principle of the ascetic system. 

Biblical exposition I do not profess: nevertheless an 
historical inquiry concerning a perverted use of scrip- 



B96 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

ture, in any important particular, almost unavoidably 
implies the making some reference to the plain import 
of such passages. The seventh chapter of Paul's first 
epistle to the Corinthians demands in fact some careful 
criticism, as well historical as biblical; but I attempt, in 
this place, only what seems indispensable in reference 
to my particular argument. 

The essential difference between apostolic and Nicene 
Christianity presents itself very prominently in com- 
paring the latter verses of the sixth chapter, with the as- 
cetic doctrine, of which some samples have already 
been produced. " What, know ye not," asks the apos- 
tle, " that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost?" 
or, as in the third chapter, " Know ye not that ye are 
the temple of God? ... if any man defile the temple of 
God " . . . . This serious truth he employs in no other 
manner than as a most powerful dissuasive from sinful 
indulgences, such as those specified in the context; and 
it is clear that, in his view. Christians living unblama- 
bly under the conjugal relationship, fulfilled the inten- 
tion of his injunctions: in abstaining from the works of 
the flesh, as enumerated Gal. v. 19, and in cherishing 
the fruits of the Spirit, the Christian law was satisfied. 
But not so with the ascetics — I mean the train of wri- 
ters, now extant, from Tertullian to St. Bernard. The 
body of a Christian is the temple of the Holy Ghost, 
say these divines, therefore — no part of it, not ordinari- 
ly exposed, must ever be seen by another eye, and 
therefore^ none but the simplest and purest substances, 
and those in the smallest possible quantities, are to be 
admitted into the stomach, and therefore the grossest 
of all terrestrial contaminations, that of the matrimonial 
connexion, is to be utterly avoided by whoever would 
be holy indeed! 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 397 

Here then we have before us, most distinctly ex- 
pressed, two doctrines of holiness, derived professedly 
from the same truth, namely, the indwelling of the Holy 
Spirit, but involving totally different principles, and 
leading to different practices. Nor is the mere difference 
all we have to notice, for, as the ascetic doctrine as- 
sumed to itself a higher credit than the apostolic, and 
was spoken of as *' a more excellent way;" or was, to 
use tlie phrase current in the Nicene age, " a merit be- 
yond law," its effect was to dislodge, or we should say 
to dethrone, the apostolic principle of morals. The apos- 
tle tells you to be holy in abstaining from vice, but we 
speak to you of a loftier and a more genuine holiness;— 
and if ye aspire to perfection, listen to us, not to him! 

The commendation of virginity, re-eclioed from all 
sides v/ithin the Nicene church, that it was " a merit 
beyond law," is alone enough to exhibit the opposition 
between the two systems. Neither in this passage of the 
epistle to the Corinthians, nor any where else in the 
New Testament, is there to be discovered the remotest 
trace of the doctrine that celibacy is " a merit," or that 
it is a holier condition, or that matrimony is, in any 
sense whatever, a spiritual degradation, or a pollution. 
This is the very point of distinction between the poi- 
sonous illusion of the ascetic system, and the simple 
rule of religious celibacy, as found in scripture. Among 
those who devote themselves to the work of the Lord, 
and especially to itinerant labours, or perilous missions 
to the heathen, it is very plain that a man who has three 
children only, must feel himself less obstructed in his 
course than one who has twelve; and so he who, al- 
though married, has no children, may advantageously 
meet difBculties which the father even of two or three 
might do better not to encounter. Clearly then, the un- 

34* 



398 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

married, supposing always that they have not misinter- 
preted ihe'ir personal calling, have an advantage, which, 
if wisely employed, may far more than compensate to 
them what they have relinquished. All this is intelligi- 
ble enough; and the reasons and motives which such a 
doctrine involves are manifestly enhanced in those sea- 
sons of trial to the church when severe privations are 
to be submitted to by Christians. It was, in our Lord's 
view, to be esteemed a favour when the storm of public 
calamity fell upon a community during the summer, ra- 
ther than the winter, and, at such a time, those were to 
be accounted comparatively happy who were not " with 
child," or *' giving suck." What can be more simple? 
And now, let reasonable men say whether such is not 
the general purport of the seventh chapter of the epis- 
tle before us: or, in other words, let it be asked whether 
this chapter teaches the ascetic principle of the higher 
sanctity of virginity, as if it were, in the Lord's sight, 
an excellence, placing those who adhere to it on a level 
above that of the married, and so much the nearer to the 
divine nature. The apostle's disquisition on this subject 
is long enough, and it is sufficiently precise to have in- 
cluded the statement of some such principle, if, indeed, 
he had held it: but instead of advancino^ the ascetic doc- 
trine, and at the very turn of his argument, ver. 25, 
when he declares that the Lord had enjoined nothing on 
the subject, and when it would have been so fit an occa- 
sion for insinuating the "higiier philosophy," he reverts 
to the temporary and special reason which might recom- 
mend celibacy — '' I suppose that this is good for the pre- 
sent distress," for a man, if unmarried, *' not to seek a 
wife." 

If then we come to ask, at ver. 38, what is meant by 
" doing better," we have only to look back to the rea- 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 399 

sons which the apostle had already advanced, and which 
involve nothing beyond the practical advantages or im- 
munities of a single life, in relation, either to seasons of 
persecution, or to extraordinary labours of evangelic zeal, 
or to any circumstances under which a Christian (per- 
sonal temperament being considered) might think him- 
self, or herself, free lo use the privilege of " waiting 
upon the Lord without distraction." ''I would that ye 
should be without carefulness" — exempt from distract- 
ing anxieties: this is the unambitious motto of the entire 
chapter; and it is here highly curious to observe, that, 
while the ascetics of the Nicene age substituted, for so 
homely and reasonable a principle, the lofty doctrine of 
seraphic virginity, they did, in their actual practice, in- 
volve themselves in all the cares of married life, and in 
worse. Let us take Chrysostom's description of " a 
holy monk's" manifold solicitudes. Paul says nothing 
about a single man's being, on that account, as holy as 
Gabriel; but he does say, that those who would please 
the Lord, might, in certain cases, do well not to marry. 
Be it remembered, that, in every instance of a compari- 
son, such as the one now before us, we have the ques- 
tion at issue always in view, whether apostolic and an- 
cient Christianity be one and the same, or, opposed, and 
contradictory. 

The custom against which Cyprian had inveighed, as 
we have seen, in the third century, at Carthage, was no 
incidental or local abuse; for it had spread itself on all 
sides, and, in the time with which we have now to do, 
it had become, notwithstanding all remonstrances, the 
usage of the coenobite ascetics, and even of some of the 
anchorets. Not only did the aged monks avail them- 
selves of the offices, and enjoy the society of young wo- 
men in their cloisters, but young monks also did the 



400 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

^same, in defiance of the scandals that could not but arise 
from so indiscreet a practice, (Chrysost. torn. i. p. 279:) 
while, on the other hand, young nuns entertained a cor- 
tege of'* philosophic" paramours, under various pretexts, 
(pp. 310, 312, et seq,) What a sig])t is it, says Chrysos- 
tom, to enter the ceil of a solitary monk, and to see the 
apartment hung about with female gear, s'hoes, girdles, re- 
ticules, caps, bonnets, spindles, combs, and th£ like, too 
many to mention; but what a iest is it to visit the abode ofa 
rich monk, and to look about you; for you find the soli- 
tary /uovocj surrounded with a bevy of lasses, one might 
say, just like the leader of a company of singing and 
dancing girls; what can be more disgraceful! /and, in 
fact, the monk is all day long vexed aiid busied >vith 
petty affairs proper to a woman .... not merely is fie 
occupied with worldly matters, contrary to the apostolic, 
precept, but even with feminine cares; and these ladi^i^s, 
being very luxurious in their habits, as well as imperi- 
ous in their tempers, tlie good man was liable to be sent 
on fifty errands — to the silversmith's, to inquire if my 
lady's mirror was finished, if her vase was ready, if her 
scent-cruet had been returned: and from the silversmith's 
to the perfumer's, and thence to the linendraper's, and 
thence to the upholsterer's; and at each place he has twen- 
ty particulars to remember. Then add to all these cares, 
the jars and scoldings that are apt to resound in a house 
full of pampered women! Paul says. Be ye not the ser- 
vants of men; shall we not then cease to be the slaves 
of women, and this to the common injury of all? 
Christ, who would have us behave ourselves as his va- 
liant soldiers, assuredly has not for this purpose clad 
us in the spiritual armour, that we should take upon our- 
selves the office of waiting, like menials, upon worthless 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 401 

girls, Kopm Tpio0oKt/tActtcov, or that we should busy ourselves 
with their spinnings and sewings, or spend the live-long 
day by their side, while at work, imbuing our minds 
with effeminate trifles!" (Abridged from pp. 295, 296, 
297.) 

So egregious and ridiculous are the inconsistencies into 
which those are sure to fall, who, not content with re- 
ligion and morality, such as God has given them to us, 
must frame to themselves something loftier. — What that 
loftier profession actually comes to, we may learn (to go 
no farther) from Chrysostom's two tracts, above cited; 
and let the reader who peruses them throughout, say 
whether we do not deal leniently with the Nicene asce- 
ticism in speaking of it only as trivial and absurd. And 
after such a perusal, and after turning to those many pas- 
sages, in the same writer, in which the powers of lan- 
guage are taxed to make up the encomium of celibacy, 
let him open again Paul's epistle to the Corinthians, 
and say — in conscience, whether an utter contrariety of 
feeling and of principle does not distinguish the two 
writers. Let it be particularly observed that the apostle 
not only does not assume any peculiar sanctity to attach 
to a single life, implying a correlative pollution as belong- 
ing to the marriage state; but he attributes such an honour, 
or recommendation, to this state (whatever his language 
may precisely mean) as that, even when impaired by 
the heathenism of one of the parties, it still conferred an 
ecclesiastical prerogative or benefit upon the other, so as 
to secure church privileges for the offspring (ver. 14.) 

The expressions occurring in the fourteenth chapter 
of the Revelation (ver. 4,) although often alluded to by 
the ascetic writers, were not, for the reasons that have 
been already mentioned, so much insisted upon as might 
have been supposed; and at present there are few, I be- 



402 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

lieve, who would admit that the passage has any bearing 
whatever upon the subject of celibacy. The well under- 
stood and ancient import of the phrases in question, 
w^hen employed prophetically and symbolically, as in* 
tending purity of faith, opposed to idolatrous (adulte- 
rous) compliances and corruptions, accords entirely with 
the obvious meaning of the context. The subjugation of 
Christendom, generally, to an adulterous, that is, an idola* 
trous power, arrogating to itself divine honours, having 
been predicted, the scene is suddenly briglitened by the 
vision of the Lamb, with his select company of the faith- 
ful, who, through all vicissitudes of their earthly war- 
fare and pilgrimage, adiiere to their holy profession, fol- 
lowing him " whithersoever he goeth." To this vision 
succeeds the fall and punishment of the idolatrous ad- 
herents of the blasphemous and apostate usurpation. 

True Christians, without any regard to the unimpor- 
tant circumstance of their being single or married, are 
called, by the apostle James (i. 18) a *' first-fruit," 
etTTctp^i) unto God, and in this place of the apocalypse, 
also, the faithful, as distinguished from the false — those 
in whose mouth no lie [-^ivSog, not Soxoc, is the reading) 
was found, are called a^itp;^«, '* a first-fruit " unto God 
and the Lamb; and they are said to be (not a<pQo^oiy which 
was the ecclesiastical term technically and ordinarily ap- 
plied to the TTd^Ssvoi, but) cty.a)/uct, unblamable; not abso- 
lutely so indeed; but in respect of their adherence to the 
true worship of God. Phrases, all of them turning 
upon the same symbolic metonymy recur in every part 
of this prophecy. Does any one imagine that the flagi- 
tious woman who had debauched the earth with her for- 
nications, and seduced kings, means nothing more than 
a personification of licentiousness, in the literal sense of 
the term? No such interpretation has ever been main- 



AS. LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 403 

tained by rational expositors: — the scarlet clad woman, 
shameless, and cruel, and arrogant, and the inveterate 
enemy of the saints, is an adulteress in the ecclesiastical 
and symbolic sense of the word, and whatever actual 
profligacy may always have attended idolatrous super- 
stitions, it is not the profligacy, but the idolatry, that is 
'mainly intended by the prophetic style. The correla- 
tive, or antithetic import then of the plirases by which 
the holy and antagonist company are designated — the 
*' true and faithful," the '* followers of the Lamb," can- 
not be misunderstood. These TrapBivctj who are they, 
but those that have refused to drink of the wine of her 
fornications, who had corrupted the nations? If these 
terms are to be understood in their literal sense, so must 
other terras with which they are connected, and then 
the endeavour to expound the book in any portion of it 
must be hopeless. 

But if there were room to entertain, for a moment, the 
supposition of a literal meaning in this place, then one 
could not but look to its bearing upon the general tenor 
of church history, or the outline of facts connected with 
the extant records of the ascetic institute. Let us then 
assume with St. Bernard (vol. ii. p. 471) that, by this vir- 
gin company is actually meant " the virgins of the church," 
-who are to enjoy an honour which is not to be shared 
4; by those, however eminent, qui non sunt virgines, quam- 
vis tamen sint Christi. Li the first place then, such an 
interpretation excludes from the privileged choir several 
of the apostles — probably all but one or two of them, 
and with them, very many of the holiest miOn and wo- 
men of every age. As to the w^orthies of our own 
times — the truly great and wise of the protestant churches, 
it is but a few that would not be excluded by this inter- 
jjretation. On the other hand, what has been the gene- 



404 THE RULE OF RELIGIOUS CELIBACY, 

ral moral condition of those whom it must include? As^ 
suredly it is with the broad characteristics of the com- 
munities or classes which it designates, that prophecy 
has to do; now a man must be resolute indeed in his 
credulity, who can actually look into the extant evidence, 
and still persuade himself that genuine purity of mind 
and manners, or that any eminent Christian qualities 
have generally belonged to the monastic orders. Take 
this evidence whence we please, from Cyprian down ta 
St. Bernard; or look no farther than to the partial testi- 
mony, and the reluctant admissions of Chrysostom,* and 
Jerome, and it will be impossible to doul)t that, while a 
few were virtuous and sincere, and at the same time fa- 
natical and extravagant, there prevailed among the many 
the worst kinds of immorality: — that is to say, either 
shameless vices, or a '^iravity of the heart that was at 
once pitiable and loathsome. And yet it is from the 
bosom of a community such as this, that the Lord (if 
this interpretation is adopted) selects his peculiar favou- 
rites! and of these (ecclesiastical) virgins it is declared 
that they were "blameless," and that nothing ^'false^^ 
was found in their mouth! How miserably are any such 

* " Alas, my soul! well may 1 so exclaim, and repeat the la- 
mentable cry, with the prophet! Alas, my soul. Our virginity 
has fallen into contempt: — the vail is rent by impudent hands, 
that parted it off from matrimony: the holy of holies is trodden 
under foot, and its grave and tremendous sanctities have become 
profane, and thrown open to all; and that which once was had in 
reverence, as far more excellent than matrimony, is now sunk so 
low, as that one should rather call the married blessed, than those 
who profess it. — Nor is it the enemy that has effected all this; 
but the virgins themselves!" — Chrysostom, tom. i. p. 304. Such 
is the confession of the warmest admirer of the ascetic life — and 
such, if we may trust him, had it become in his times. Jerome's 
testimony to the same effect, will be referred to presently. 



AS LAID DOWN IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 405 

designations contradicted by the ordinary characteristics 
of the ascetic records! Read the ** Lives of the Saints " 
— read the Lausaic history, and what presents itself on 
every page but the details of self-deception and knavery? 
What, but a digested system of vain pretensions, and 
profitable frauds, or, in a word — Lies, either in the sense 
of delusions, or in the sense of wilful falsifications? 
Take the very choicest specimens of Nicene monkery 
(to some of which I have already alluded,) such, for in- 
stance, as the life of St. Antony, or that of St. Hilarion, 
by Jerome, or that of St. Martin of Tours, and then let 
any one who retains his hold of common sense, deter- 
mine whether these narratives are distinguished most 
by the spirit of holy simplicity, modesty, and Truth; 
or of wonder-loving extravagance, delusion, and Lying? 
I ask pointedly for a conscientious reply to this definite 
question. In taking instances such as these, we give 
the ascetic system the greatest advantage possible; that 
is to say, we leave untouched the heap of abominations, 
and we adduce the very brightest instances, from what 
is spoken of as " the golden age" of the monastic sys- 
tem. Few protestants, surely, will be so courageous as 
first to adopt the literal interpretation of the passage in 
question, and then to appeal to church history, and the 
monkish legends in support of such an expositionl The 
real meaning of the phrases, surrounded as they are by 
symbolic language, drawn from the same analogy, and 
concerning which there can be no doubt, will not, I 
think, be questioned by any but those who can spare 
nothing that may give a seeming support to a groundless 
doctrine. 



35^ 



406 THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 



THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 

There is however yet a passage, and it is a signal 
one, which demands to be adverted to in connexion with 
our present subject. I mean Paul's plain prediction of 
the approacliing apostacy (1 Tim. iv.) But here again 
we are met by that protestant habit of thinking, which 
has, in so many instances, impelled the anxious oppo- 
nents of the papacy to attribute s])€cifically to ihe JRomish 
church, what, in truth, belongs to it only in common 
with the eastern, and with the Nicene church. Now, 
for example, not a phrase occurs in this most remarka- 
ble prediction — a prediction announced as "explicit," 
not symbolical, which can equitably be applied to the 
papacy, as distinguished from the church catholic, east- 
ern and western, of the Nicene age: each characteristic 
of the ** apostacy," as here specified, must have been 
admitted to have had its accomplishment in the ecclesi- 
astical system of the fourth century, even if no such 
despotism as that of Rome had afterwards come into 
existence. It is otherwise with the mystic and difficult 
prophecy recorded in the second epistle to the Thessa- 
lonians; this latter having a more determinate and hie- 
rarchical import, while the one now in question has a 
wider meaning, and has respect rather to the moral 
qualities of the predicted defection. 

Let us only imagine that the church universal had 
been brought back to apostolic purity in the sixth or 
seventh century, and that thenceforward, and to the pre- 
sent time, it had retained its integrity: how should we, 
in that case, have applied this prediction? Clearly, and 
without a doubt, to the ascetic doctrine, and to the mo- 



THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 407 

naslic institute of the preceding four centuries. Each 
prophetic mark is actually found upon that system; nor 
is there any other Christian system, or sect, or institute, 
in any age or. country, that has borne them. The pro- 
phecy having been issued under this very condition of 
its being a plain and literal description, we find it to 
have been literally reahzed within the church, and to 
have presented itself, with singular uniformity as to its 
characteristics, in every section of the church: and this 
well-defined error is termed an Apostacy, involving the 
church which harboured, sanctioned, and idolized it, iu 
the most serious reprobation. 

Those who choose to do so, may amuse their leisure 
with a dozen ingenious methods for evading the appli- 
cation of this remarkable prophecy; but no such subter- 
fuges will satisfy unsophisticated minds, and it is to such 
that the prediction is immediately addressed. Is it not 
a Daniel that is appealed to on this occasion? for there 
are no dark symbols to be interpreted, there is no my- 
thos to be unfolded. The Spirit speaketh, p«Ta?, as the 
Lord himself had done when he foretold the manner of 
his own death and the time of his resurrection. Pro- 
phecy, when delivered in this style, difi'ers from history 
only in the brevity of its descriptions, and in the mere 
circumstance of its preceding the event. And if, in 
such an instance, a real ambiguity, or a confessed difii- 
culty is found to attend the application of the prediction, 
our alternative must be either the conclusion in which 
infidelity would triumph, or the strange supposition that 
the church was thus explicitly forewarned of a danger 
which it was not to encounter until the remotest period 
of its history. 

But how stands the prediction when it comes to be 
placed by the side of the church history of the first five 
centuries? 



40S THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 

The Spirit explicitly declares that, in the after seasons, 
that is, in the times succeeding the era of the apostolic 
personal ministry, some '^*J's?, shall apostatize from the 
faith — from the principles of Christianity. Some — as 
if it were a portion of the church, or certain churches, 
or certain individuals, and not the whole body. Now, 
although the entire church, and especially as represented 
by its chiefs, did in fact share in the ascetic apostacy, 
by approving it, it was specifically the error of a class, 
or brotherhood, every where existing indeed, yet no 
where embracing the community. It was otherwise in 
relation to the worshipping of images, and the praying 
to the saints, which were the errors of the church at 
large, while the ascetic practice was the error of some, 
and the marks of apostacy here mentioned are peculiarly 
the characteristics of the anchorets and coenobites, or 
the ascetics of the two classes, the solitary and the con- 
ventual. 

The ellipsis of the third verse being supplied, as it must, 
by the word ^sxgt/ovrav, or one of similar import, then the 
meaning will be that the body, or community, or sect, 
to which the prediction relates, will be distinguished by 
it insisting, in an absolute and invariable manner, and in 
relation to all who come within the circle of its autho- 
rity, upon abstinence from matrimony, and from the or- 
dinary indulgences of the appetite. Whatever diversi- 
ties might be admitted in relation to other points of dis- 
cipline within this apostate community, no exceptions 
could be allowed in regard to these two. The first law 
(and an iron law) of this predicted body should be the 
preservation of virginity, and its second law, equally 
binding upon all, although susceptible of diversities in 
the interpretation, was — a general and severe abstemious- 
ness, as to diet, and the most rigorous occasional fast- 
ings. So it should be, that, after setting oflf every va- 



THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 409 

riable or incidental peculiarity attaching to this apostacy, 
in different times, and communities, these two marks 
should always belong to it, namely, the enforcement, or 
the pretended enforcement (for hypocrisy was also to be 
a characteristic of the system) of celibacy, and of fast- 
ing. And we are directed to look, not around the 
church, but within its pale, for the defection which is 
thus described. 

Whatever force we may attach to the words — " For- 
bid,*'* and " Command," they can mean no more than 
a peremptory and invariable injunction, affecting who- 
ever comes within the limits of the legislating body. The 
Romish church did not enforce celibacy either upon the 
clergy of the eastern church, or upon Persian mages; 
for its jurisdiction did not extend so far; but its prohi- 
bitions reached to the utmost border of its acknowledged 
authority, and even within that circle, w^hile it laid down 
an irreversible law, admitting of no exemptions, the most 
flagrant violations, both in regard to continence, and ab- 
stinence, every where prevailed. The papacy took to 
itself these marks of an apostate church, by exerting all 
its authority for maintaining the ascetic principle and 
practice, as well in relation to the secular, as the regular 

**Kax:;a)j hinder, restrain, deny permission, or forbid, whe- 
ther authoritatively and effectively, or only in intention: impe- 
dio quovis modo, et factis et verbis, quominus aliquid fiat. To 
prohibit by edicts, and under penalties, is a special sense of the 
word. But, as well in a more general, as in a more strict sense, 
the ancient church, that is, of the fourth century, forbade to mar- 
ry — absolutely, within the pale of the ascetic community; and 
generally, as to the clergy, by the force of opinion and usage. 
What the encratites did in the second century, the church catho- 
lic did in the fourth ; and any endeavour to affix the prediction, 
now before us, to that early sect, must a fortiori j attach it also to 
the ascetic system of the next age. 

35* 



410 THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 

clergy. But then, the Nicene church, long before, had 
done the very same thing, and had, in like manner, 
branded itself as apostate, and not in an incidental or 
partial manner, but by directing the steady force of its 
utmost influence toward the end of giving extensive ef- 
fect to the ascetic rule of life. The only style of Chris- 
tianity which it would consent to speak of as complete, 
and pre-eminently excellent, was that which observed 
this ascetic rule. The highest encomiums, as we have 
seen, were lavished upon these two foremost articles of 
the monastic institute — virginity and abstinence. Every 
one of its great divines gives his zealous support and 
solemn sanction to this institute; and, if celibacy were 
not sternly and invariably enforced upon its clergy, they 
were taught to think themselves degraded if they refused 
to observe it. Mean while, as to the ascetic body, the 
law of celibacy was, in the fullest sense, absolute. 

The point now before us is of no small importance; 
for the inference it involves fixes the apostolic brand of 
apostacy upon the Nicene church, and therefore goes 
far in determining, by a summary method, the present 
controversy concerning *' church principles." I confi- 
dently appeal, then, in this instance, to plain, unpreju- 
diced minds, and ask whether or not Paul's prediction 
attaches to the asceticism of the ancient church?*" 

Protestant commentators, in referring to this predic- 
tion, have been wont to call it — *' a striking prediction 
o{ popery, ^^ But why of jwpery? as well say, "of 
Spanish Catholicism," or " of Irish Catholicism." The 
special marks herein given us, attach, distinctively, nei- 

* Let the reader consider, in this connexion, Jerome's state- 
ment of the errors of Jovinian, of which he courteously says — 
hsec sunt sibilia serpentis antiqui. Adv. Jovin. lib. i. toward the 
beginning. 



THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 411 

ther to the Irish, nor to the Spanish forms of the gene- 
ral superstition; nor to the papacy peculiarly. The 
Romish church, centuries after the monastic institute 
had been every where established, and long after the 
time when the celibacy of the secular clergy had been 
universally assented to as proper, if not indispensable, 
gave its sanction, formally, to the common opinion, by 
specific enactments. But in what terms had the Nicene 
church uttered itself on this subject long before? — hear 
its highest authority; Certe confiteris non posse esse 
episcopum, qui in episcopatu filios faciat; alioqui, si de- 
prehensus fuerit, non quasi vir (husband) tenebitur, sed 
quasi adulter damnabitur.* That is to say, in effect, 
whereas, Paul had distinctly spoken of a bishop as a 
married man, and a father, the Nicene church, having 
first had its " conscience seared as with a hot iron," 
read the apostolic text, and then deliberately decided 
that a bishop who did not separate himself from his 
wife, should be regarded as no better than an adulterer! 
Again; Aut virgines clericos accipiunt, aut continentes; 
aut, si uxores habuerint, mariti esse desinunt,^ That 
is to say, whereas the Lord had solemnly decreed that 
*'w^hat God had joined together, man should not put 
asunder," the Nicene church, having lost all religious 
sensibility of conscience, could coolly look at this di- 
vine law, and then reverse it by its own impious ordi- 
nance, that its ministers, in receiving orders, should se- 
parate themselves from their wives— 2l law to which 
submission was yielded in innumerable instances. Upon 
many, excommunication was actually inflicted on ac- 
count of their having returned to the society of their 
wives, after ordination: in many instances, when mar- 

* Adversus Jovin. lib. i. f Ad versus Vigilantum, 



412 THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACT, 

ried men had been promoted to ecclesiastical dignitieg^ 
in compliance with the tumultuous will of the populace, 
a long course of penance was imposed upon them, in 
order to expiate the offence. In several recorded in- 
stances men who sincerely desired lo evade such pro- 
motions pleaded their disqualificalion, on the very ground 
of their being married men. The second council of 
Carthage, held within the limits of the Nicene era, thus 
speaks — Omnibus (episcopis) placet, utepiscopi, presby- 
teri, et diaconi, et qui sacramenta contrectant, pudicitije 
custodes, etiam ab uxoribus se abstineant!* Epiphani- 
ust offers an apology for those cases in which, by sheer 
necessity, married men had been admitted to priest's 
orders; and, from Cyprian downwards, the flagrant im- 
piety of a man's '* putting away his wife," when pro- 
moted to the episcopate, received authentication in the 
practice of the most eminent persons. During the same 
time, not only did thousands of persons yield obedience 
to the monastic law, and renounce marriage; but hun- 
dreds put away their wives, deserted their children, and 
hid themselves in monasteries; and their doing so, es- 
pecially when they surrendered their patrimony to the 
church, was lauded as the highest act of piety .J 

Does then the prophetic mark of "forbidding to mar- 
ry," attach, or not, to the Nicene church generally, and 
to the monastic institute specifically; oris it equitable to 
go on saying, as we have been used to do, that this is a 
sign of the apostate papacy? Is not this a question 
simply historical, and admitting of a peremptory an- 
swer — Yea or Nay? 

* Con. Carthag. can. 2. t Hoeres. 59. 

X Basil will be hereafter cited in illustration of this article of 
the monastic economy — namely, the surrender of all property, 
and generally to the monastery. 



THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 413 

As to the other definite sign, the " commanding to ab- 
stain from meat,"* there can, I think, be no need to ad- 
duce formal evidence. The practices of abstinence from 
animal food, and the rigorous fasts enjoined by the an- 
cient church, and especially enforced within the monas- 
tic houses, are too well understood, and have been too 
often described, to leave room for a question on the sub- 
ject. But let us turn to the other, and less definite cha- 
racteristics of the predicted apostacy, and in doing so 
we may recede, in our order, from the fixed points, al- 
ready considered. 

These apostate communities, or individuals, within 
the church, were so to speak and act, as to prove that 
they had lost, in a deplorable degree, their sensibility as 
religious men — " having their consciences seared as 
with a hot iron." That is to say, as when, to an ulce- 
rated or mortified limb (according to the rough methods 
of the ancient surgery) a heated iron was applied, with 
the intention of destroying, for ever, the sensibility of 
the diseased part. What then may be the meaning of 
this bold figure as applied to those who prohibited mar- 
riage, and enjoined fasting? One should say, that it 
described the state of mind of those who, having sur- 
rendered themselves to the influence of some false and 
pernicious religious principle, had, in so doing, become, 
as it were, unconscious of, or incapable of perceiving, 
the very plainest injunctions of the divine law. A si- 
milar condition of the conscience we have an instance 
of in the pharisees, to whom our Lord applies, with in- 
dignant scorn, the epithets — *' fools, and blind — phari- 

* In what way these two main articles of asceticism bore one 
upon the other, producing the worst evils, appears from the con- 
fessions of the monkish writers; see, for instance, Cassian, p. 
759, et seq. and Jerom, ad Eustach. 



414 THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 

see, hypocrite — blind pharisee;" and who, \vi}h God's 
law before ihem, to which they owned submission, yet, 
set it at defiance, and made it void by their wicked and 
foolish enactments. 

What phrase then can better describe (in so few 
words) the religious condition of the ascetic mind? The 
false oriental philosophy having been admitted, which 
put abstraction and penance in the room of the gospel, 
and of true holiness, a thick infatuation thenceforward 
took possession of all minds, so that the most extreme 
contradictions of the inspired rules of morality were al- 
lowed and approved, even while this rule itself was daily 
before the eyes, and was echoing in the ears of all. A 
sufficient instance of this sort of contumacy is the one al- 
ready adduced: no practical rule, any v/here found in the 
apostolic writings, is more clear, or more free from am- 
biguity, than that which permits and recommends the 
marriage state to bishops; nevertheless, with this rule 
full in its view, the Nicene church forbade matrimony to 
its bishops. Our Lord, in the tone of the supreme law- 
giver, said, " let not man put asunder what God has 
joined;" and the apostle determines, that, even the hea- 
thenism of one party should not be held a ground of ex- 
ception to this rule. But tlie Nicene church, fully in- 
formed of God's law, in this respect, decided otherwise, 
and, on pain of degradation, or even excommunication, 
decreed that a priest or bisliop, if already married, should 
separate himself from his wife; and it pronounced those 
who did not do so, to be living in adultery! Christ liad 
said, to do this is a sin: the Nicene church said, not to 
to do it is a sin; and to do it is an angelic merit. The 
apostle says, *' whoremongers and adulterers God will 
judge:" the church said, he is an adulterer who, on re- 
ceiving priest's orders, does not put away his wife ! 



THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 415 

This then is what we may well understand as *' having 
the conscience seared as with a hot iron."* 

On this point, again, let the substantial injustice that 
has so long been done to the church of Rome, by pro- 
testants, be adverted to and disclaimed. To the vast 
majority of all who have lived under the shadow of the 
papacy — clergy and laity, the scriptures have ever been 
sealed, or at best, very partially known; and not known 
at all, as to the passages that are flatly opposed to the 
Romish errors. With respect to such, therefore, there 
did not take place this cauterizing of the conscience; and 
many affecting instances are on record, of the painful 
sensibility of those who, happening to hear something 
more than they had heretofore learned of God's word, 
mournfully exclaimed, — *' If this be God's word, all 
that we have hitherto been taught, is utterly false." But 
the case was quite otherwise with the Nicene church; 
and this indeed is at once its wonder, its merit in one 
sense, and its sin in another, that, while the grossest 
superstitions were promoted, and the most outrageous 
violations of scriptural piety were practised, the scrip- 
tures themselves were copiously read and expounded 
in the churches, and were actually in the hands of the 
opulent, at least, and were thoroughly familiar to many 
of the ascetics.t In whatever way we may account for 

* Perhaps we could no where find a more striking instance of 
this cauterizing of the conscience, than in the case of Jerome, 
who, with more knowledge of the scriptures than any other di- 
vine of his times (and few of any age have surpassed him) coolly 
cuts a path for himself through the sacred text, whenever he has 
a point of superstition to carry. His tracts against Jovinian 
and Vigilantius abound with instances of this kind of audacity. 
To these we must hereafter refer. 

f it is affirmed by Palladius, Jerome, and otherS; in their lives of 



416 THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 

this inconsistency, the fact should surely be taken into 
the reckoning when we are balancing the merits of the 
Nicene and Romish churches; and if the particular mark 
of a cauterized conscience be in question, it must be 
granted to attach more directly to those who, knowing 
fully their Lord's will, yet boldly set it at naught, than 
to those who, although doing the same thing, knew not 
that will. 

'' Speaking lies in hypocrisy" — naiTating falsehoods, 
for the purpose, as we colloquially say, of '' making out 
a case;" or, " of putting a good face upon things." Now 
really one can hardly imagine a phrase that could better 
describe the legend-telling style of the ascetic writers. 
There is absolutely no class of waiters, in the whole 
range of literature, at all to be compared with these, in 
this respect. Wonder-mongers are they, from the ear- 
liest to the latest of the tribe; and these wonders—these 
tales of exploits, passing human strength and virtue, 
have all one meaning, and one and the same manifest in- 
tention, namely, that of glorifying the ascetic institute. 
Open these books where you please, and you will rare- 
ly find two pages together destitute of some tale of saint- 
ly prowess; and each has the ever-recurring moral — 
" What giants of piety are we monks!" Let the reader 
say whether it be not so, and for this purpose let him 
take in hand any one of the Nicene ascetic writers, and 
then decide whether this mark also of the predicted apos- 
tacy does not belong to the ascetic institute of the an- 
cient church. Are not the ascetics the tellers and makers 
of falsehoods, for an interested purpose — *' in hypocri- 
sy?"* 

tlie hermits, that some of them could repeat, memoriter, a large 
portion of the scriptures, and some the New Testament entire. 
* Jerome's Jjife of St. Hilarion, his contemporary, I rccom- 



THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 417 

" Giving heed to seducing spirits, and teachings of, 
or concerning, demons." Of all error, and of each in 
particular, it might be affirmed, that it was suggested by 
evil spirits: the phrases thus understood, would therefore 
have no specific import, nor could they avail us in endea- 
vouring to attach the prediction to any one of the thou- 
sand heresies that have sprung up within tlie church. — 
But as it is the characteristic of the prophetic style to be 
definite, we must take these phrases in their characteristic 
sense, and assume that the "teachings," to which "some 
should give heed," were narrations, and pretended re- 
velations, concerning supernal beings, or the invisible 
species that are believed to haunt the earth. Now what 
is that element which we find every w^here mixed up 
with the ascetic records? what is it by which the con- 
tinence, the abstinences, the macerations, and the mi- 
racles of the ascetic worthies are made to assume a dra- 
matic air? Is it not the ever-recurring tales of conflicts, 
personal and visible, w^ith the infernal legions? Is not 
this taste for demonological adventures the very charac- 
teristic of monkery? and has it not been so from the 
earliest to the latest times? The farce of monkery has, 
in every age, sho^vn the same personages on the stage — 
namely, the gaunt spectres of humanity, the monks and 
hermits, and the same aerial troops, besetting these 
heroes like swarms of wasps. In proof and illustration 
of all these predicted characteri^stics of the ancient asce- 
ticism, we could not do better than appeal to the most 
elaborate, and the most aulheniic of ail the extant me- 

mend entire to the calm consideration of those who would satisfy 
themselves as to the point now in hand. Let this piece be in- 
cluded among those selected to make up the Library of the Fa- 
thers: the Christian community would then fairly know what 13 
before them. 

30 



418 THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 

morials of this order of piety — the piece I have already 
referred to — Athanasius's life of St. Antony. In this^ 
we have a genuine portrait of Nicene monkery in its 
very fairest colours; and the features it presents are pre- 
cisely those which constitute the prophetic marks of the 
predicted apostacy. — That is to say — a sternly enforced 
celibacy, as the chief of all virtues, — a rigorous system 
of abstinence, entire as to animal food, and extreme in 
all kinds,* — an obstinate contrariety to scripture pre- 
cepts and principles, even while scripture is on the lip — 
an unbounded credulity in regard to invisible agency, 
and a general style o^ pretefision, as to miraculous pow- 
ers, and superhuman virtues, such as involves more than 
a suspicion of deliberate knavery. I must here warmly 
recommend the conscientious inquirer, first, to fix in 
his mind the several particulars of Paul's characteristics 
of the coming apostacy, and then to peruse those memo- 
rials of the Nicene asceticism which he will find almost on 
every page of the church historians, Socrates, Sozomen, 
and Theodoret, and in Alhanasius, Chrysostom, Palla- 
dius, and Jerome. 

But there yet remains a mark to be considered. Those 
who should apostatize, were to do so in giving heed to 
*' seducing spirits." — False teachers, say the commen- 
tators, and no doubt truly; but yet too indefinitely. As 
any heresy or error may be attributed to tlie influence of 
infernal suggestions, so does every error take its rise 
from, and spread by the means of '* false teachers;" — 

^ Jerome, in his Life of Hilarion, describes, very minutely and 
solemnly, the saint's diet, in each period of his long ascetic 
course, who never broke his fast until sunset. No person of in- 
genuous mind can read this life and not acknowledge that the 
JNicene asceticism is distinctly marked as the apostacy whichi 
'SsmI predicted. 



THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 419 

tliis vague interpretation, therefore, although true generi- 
cally, does not aid us in attaching the prediction to its 
object: so understood, the terms will apply to whatever 
we please. Let it be inquired, then, whether there be 
not a meaning more precise, couched in the phraseology. 
The " giving heed " seems to indicate a listening to 
something from without, as if a doctrine, foreign to the 
church, and of extraneous origin, had caught the ear of 
the community, and had captivated certain minds. Now, 
with the facts before us, that the church borrowed, as 
well the principle, as the practices and rules of its asceti- 
cism from the oriental contemplatists, the phrase in ques- 
tion receives at once a specific meaning. Those who 
*' turned away from the faith," did so in listening to a 
foreign doctrine. 

Then, should we err, or assume more than history 
makes good, in understanding these *' seducing spirits," 
as the gnostic teachers, arrogating to themselves the title 
9rnvfjLcLi:iKoi, and whose doctrine was not merely seduc- 
tive, or erroneous in a general sense, but specifically 
characterised by its lawless and interminable roamings<, 
through the dark and unknown regions of the spiritual 
universe? Such, eminently, were those impostors and 
dreamers, in giving heed to whom the more ardent and 
meditative members of the early church fell into the 
snare of the oriental asceticism, and became the authors 
of a system of factitious pietism, which quickly dis- 
placed apostolic Christianity. 

Let it now be imagined that monkery had been con- 
fined to the eastern church, and that it had not arisen 
until the sixth century, so as that it had stood related in 
no way to any system with which our modern opinions 
or institutions are implicated. In that case, should we 
have felt any difficulty in appropriating to it the apostolic 



420 THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 

prediction — an aposlacy, arising within the church, and 
iiiarked by the prohibition of marriage, and of meats, 
by contempt of the divine law, by impudent pretensions, 
and iiypocrisies, and by a boundless credulity, in regard 
to demoniacal agency? — would not these characters have 
been enough to convince us that the prediction had re^ 
ceived its fulfilment? But, in fact, tiiis same asceticism 
has, in an equal degree, affected the western church; 
nor have protestant commentators hesitated — how should 
they hesitate in so plain a case? — to avail themselves of 
this prediction, as marking the apostacy of Rome. Un- 
fortunately, however, in our eagerness — the eagerness 
natural to controvertists— to attach this brand to the pa- 
pacy, we have too much forgotten that Rome only in- 
herited and shared the more ancient apostacy. What 
justice then, or what historical accuracy, is there in the 
customary protestant comment on this passage — " a 
clear prediction of the monastic system of the Romish 
church?''^ With quite as m.uch propriety might the be- 
lief of the resurrection be called " a dogma of the pa- 
pacy." 

Nothing so much favours a bad cause as to load it 
V'ith more disgrace than strictly belongs to it; for, in so 
doing, we enlist in its defence the best feelings. Popery 
will live and triumph so long as those corruptions con- 
tinue to be called popish which, in fact, were much more 
ancient. In the present instance I appeal to serious and 
candid minds, competently informed in church history, 
and ask whether the Brand of apostacy be not herein 
fixed by the apostolic hand upon — the Nicene Church? 
Perhaps no method more conclusive or concise could be 
adopted by a conscientious inquirer, in relation to the 
present controversy, than that of so making himself ac- 
quainted with the Ascetic Institution of the fourth cen» 



THE PREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 421 

tury, as to be able to reply, for himself, to the question, 
■ — Whether that institution meets and satisfies the terms 
of the predicted apostacy? 

I am inclined to press this definite argument, nor 
shall easily consent to its being evaded. What can be 
more summary or clear than the process of reasoning we 
have to pursue; for a multifarious controversy converges 
to a focus at this point. The Christianity of the fourth 
century is now proposed to us as our pattern, or as an 
imbodied exposition of the apostolic mind, written and 
unwritten. Specifically, this body of principles and 
practices is said to be contained in the extant writings of 
Athanasius, Basil, and Ambrose. (Let any others be 
added; protestants will except against none.) Now 
these waiters, along with their contemporaries, have 
handed down to us, with their warmest approval, be- 
side the great dogmas of theology, and the general prin- 
ciples of Christian morality, and of worship, and of 
church government, a certain artificial scheme of life, 
not enjoined, indeed, upon all Christians, but recom- 
mended as *'the more excellent way," and as that 
w^hich the most devoted souls would always embrace. 
By eminence this scheme is, in their view, tho path of 
perfection. 

Moreover it is a simple historical fact, that this same 
scheme of life, unaltered in any of its principles or re- 
quirements, has come down from age to age, and is now 
extant, entire, as a main element of Romanism. The 
monkery of the papacy, is in form and substance — the 
ascetic system of the third and fourth centuries. The 
difference between the two does not amount to so much 
as the diversities that distinguish one order of regulars 
from another. If an exception to the present argument 

36* 



422 THE TREDICTED ASCETIC APOSTACY. 

can be raised upon the ground of the difference between 
papistical monkery and Nicene asceticism, let that dif- 
ference be clearly stated, and be shown also to be such 
as affects our intended conclusion. 

But, in the monkery of Romanism, and not less in 
the Nicene ascetic institute, we find, beyond all doubt 
or question, Paul's marks of the coming apostacy; nor 
is there any other system, or body, or sect, within, or 
around the pale of the church, to which these designa- 
tions can be made to attach. 

It is also to be observed, and the highest importance 
belongs to the fact, that, while the reformers, German, 
Swiss, and English, paid a modest and religious regard 
to antiquity, and have left many proofs of their desire to 
adhere to it, as far as they could, they, one and all, ut- 
terly rejected the ancient asceticism, and broadly sepa- 
rated the cliurches they founded from the branded apos- 
tacy, ancient, and strongly recommended as it was. 

Again, it is to be noticed, that those who, at the pre- 
sent moment, are explicitly or cove^rtly giving it to be 
understooid that they have very little sympathy with the 
reformers, and that they would gladly put the Nicene 
fathers in their room, are also favourably looking toward 
the ancient ascetic institute, in its several elements, and 
are not hesitating to recommend its characteristic articles. 

These momentous considerations, and significant facts, 
I recommend to the dispassionate attention of those 
whose consciences are not ''seared as with a hot iron."' 
Let it not however be supposed that I would apply this, 
or any such phrase, in an opprobrious sense to the pre- 
sent promoters of a&ceticism, or as if it implied, in their 
case, a moral turpitude, or a conscious resistance to truth 
perceived. What it does imply, in my own use of il', 
in this instance, maybe otherwise termed, a being given 



EXTENT OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, ETC. 423 

up to an INFATUATION, which, like a thick fog, actually 
conceals from the view, objects the nearest at hand. 
Our own times have furnished two or three signal in- 
stances of this sort of " strong delusion," of which some 
have become the victims, whose sincerity ought not to 
be questioned, and who have given notoriety to their 
pitiable fate by eminent powers of mind, and many 
shining accomplishments. In considering cases of this 
sort, a grim suspicion as to the real origin^ or as one 
might say — authorship^ of such delusions forces itself 
upon the mind, and returns, again and again, after it 
may have been dismissed at the remonstrance either of 
skepticism, or of charity. The counterfeit piety of the 
monastic system, was the fatally successful "tempta- 
tion" of the ancient church: — the revival of the very 
same principle and system, under the attractive colours 
of a high-wrought refinement, to what can we trace it 
but to the immortal craft of the same adversary? 



THE EXTENT OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, 
AND THE SANCTION IT RECEIVED FROM 
THE NICENE CHURCH. 

Nothing is more monotonous than the story of the 
monkish life, whether pagan. Christian, or Mahometan. 
This phantasy, or ignis fatuus of the ecclesiastical levels, 
find it in what climate we may, or, whether we look for 
it in our own times, or in the middle ages, or in the 
Nicene age, or in the remotest periods of history, shows 
the same form and the same hue. Like the long trains 



424 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 

of figures that adorn the passages of an Egyptian tem- 
ple, there is throughout, one costume, one physiognomy, 
one style of attitudes, one dull ground, and one or two 
crude colours. 

It is really surprising to find in how small a degree the 
widest diversities of religious belief, as well as the most 
extensive differences of climate, and national character, 
have modified this immemorial species of insanity. 
During the lapse of at least three thousand years, the 
first principles, the aim, the practices, and even the visi- 
ble and graphic characteristics of the ascetics, whether 
eremite or ccenobite, have remained nearly the same, or 
have varied only as a flower in the green-house, or the 
hot-house, may differ from its variety, afield. It is, in 
fact, just thus that the Nicene monkery is to be distin- 
guished from that of the Nubian gymnosophists, and 
the Indian brahmans, of the remotest antiquity. The 
high and close temperature of the church, brought out 
richer colours and more leafage, and even, we may al- 
low, a better fruit; but the plant has always been the 
same. 

The chagrin of the Romish missionaries in finding, 
wherever Buddhism had prevailed, the very counterpart 
of their own hierarchical and monastic system, was oc- 
casioned by the near resemblance, or rather identity of 
all institutes founded upon the ascetic principle — " The 
devil," said they, "has been at work here, spitefully 
mimicking the church for our special mortification." 
These good and zealous men would have kept nearer, 
at once, to historical and to theological truth, in saying 
that, what the crafty adversary had really done was to 
set the church mimicking the pagan delusion. 

Madmen are said to be insensible to changes of tem- 
perature; for the mind, having come under the tyranny 



IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH. 425 

Gf sojne one idea, or single class of impressions, ceases 
to be conscious of whatever might divert it. Sultry- 
heat and extreme frost are the same to the maniac, and 
thus, and it is a highly curious fact, the ascetics of the 
torrid zone were not surpassed, as to contempt of the 
extremes of heat and cold, by the anchorets of the then 
frozen forests of Germany and Gaul, who would give 
up no point of their discipline — a discipline borrowed 
from Syria and Egypt, during the utmost severities of a 
northern winter. Should this fortitude be regarded as 
the mild constancy of Christian courage, or as the iron 
insensibility of lunacy? 

The burning solitudes of Upper Egypt,* and the 
craggy seclusions of Nubia, had, from time immemorial, 
been occupied by a race of troglodyte sages, whose suc- 
cessors of the Nicene era adhered to the very same 
modes of life, and professed the very same abstract prin- 
ciples, differing only in the phrases they made use of, 
and in the circumstance of putting themselves in alliance 
with the church. The church, on her part, acknow- 
ledged them as her most illustrious and devoted sons, 
and made them the objects of her unmeasured admira- 
tion. India was, however, the cradle of the anchoreti(^ 
life, and Buddhu the father of its doctrines; and in like 
manner as all Christendom, during many centuries, was 
accustomed to look to Egypt and Nubia for its brightest 
patterns of holy abstraction and mortification, so did 
these refer to the banks of the Indus, and the Ganges, 
as the sources of their doctrine and practice. 

* The excavated rocks which, in earlier times, had been te- 
nanted by robbers, or by outlaws, and afterwards by the coiners 
of bti'^e money (Jerom. Vita S. Paul,) afforded sepulchral shelter 
to the Christian ascetics. 



426 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 

Strabo,* Arrian,t Diodorus SiculiiSjJ Porphyry, § as 
well as several of the fathers, especially Clement of 
Alexandria, II and Augustine,^ have handed down inci- 
dental notices of the philosophy and manners of the In- 
dian and Egyptian gymnosophists, such as are amply 
sufficient for tlie purpose of identifying the ancient, and 
the more recent — the Buddhist, and the Christian ascetic 
institute. These professors of a divine philosophy, like 
their Christian imitators, went nearly naked; they occu- 
pied caverns or chinks in the rocks; they abstained en- 
tirely from animal food; they professed inviolable vir- 
ginity;*"^ they practised penance; they passed the greater 
part of their lime in mute meditation; they imposed si- 
lence and absolute submission upon their disciples; they 
professed the doctrine, that the perfection of human na- 
ture consists in an annihilation of the passions, and of 
every affection which nature has implanted, whether in 
the animal or the mental constitution: abnegation was, 
with them, the one point of wisdom and virtue, and a 
reabsorption of the human soul into the abyss of the di- 
vine mind, was the happy end of the present system, to 
the pure and wise. 

Now, one might reasonably have supposed, that a 
system of doctrine and practice such as this, if it were 
to come at all under the powerful influence of Christi- 
anity, must have admitted some extensive modifications: 
but it was not so in fact: — a few phrases and another di- 

* Strabo, lib. xv. 

f Arrian, Exped. Alex. lib. vii. c. 1; and Hist. Ind. c. 11. 
t Diod. lib. ii. 

§ Porph. de Abstinent, lib. iv. 

II Clemens. Strom, lib. i. and iii. ^ 

^August. Civ. Dei, lib. xiv. c. 17; and lib. xv. c. 20. 
^* Non enim est hoc bonum, nisi cum fit secundum fidem sum- 
mi boni, qui est Deus. Civ. Dei. 



IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH. 427 

alect, or slang, adopted, make almost all the difference 
which serves to distinguish the ancient gymnosophist, 
from the Christian anchoret of the Nicene age. If we 
are to confide in those highly encomiastic descriptions 
of these latter, which adorn the pages of the Christian 
writers of that era, the one institute was a close imita- 
tion of the other. The extant information bearing on this 
subject is not scanty, and it is furnished, explicitly, or is 
incidentally confirmed, by Eusebius, Socrates, Sozomen,* 
Theodoret, Athanasius, Palladius, Sulpitius Severus, 
Cassian, Jerome, Chrysostom, Basil, Augustine, Isidore, 
Ephrem, some of whom furnish the minutest details of 
the " seraphic life," and all speak of it in terms of won- 
der and admiration. 

The more rigid and heroic of the Christian anchorets 
dispensed with all clothing except a rug, or a few palm- 
leaves round the loins.t Most of them abstained from 
the use of water for ablution;! nor did they usually 
wash or change the garments they had once put on; thus 
St. Antony bequeathed to Athanasius a skin in which 
his sacred person had been wrapped for half a century. 
They also allowed their beards and nails to grow, and 
sometimes became so hirsute, as to be actually mis- 
taken for hyaenas or bears. § It need not be said that ce- 

* Perhaps there is no where to be found a less exceptionabls 
statement of the nature and purport of the monastic life than 
the one given by Sozomen, lib. i. c. 12. He subjoins also a rea- 
sonahle history of the origin of the institution; but let the reader 
go on to the history of the monk AmmonI 

t Jerom. Vita S. Paul. 

+ '' It is idle to think of cleanliness in a hair-cloth!" Jerom. 
Vita Hilarion. 'H vi-l'Ct/uivog jcctv tcv; Trc^a; vSjl^i. Athan. Vita 
S. Ant. p. 504. 

§ Palladius reports several instances of this kind : it is super- 
fluous to cite passages in reference to facts which have been so 



428 THI5 ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCflON 

libacy was the first law of this institute, and that an 
abstinence the most rigid was its second law. Many, 
having scooped narrow cells for themselves in the cre- 
vices of precipitous rocks, bnilt themselves in, leaving 
only a small aperture, and depended entirely upon the 
piety of their disciples, or admirers, for supplying their 
daily wants. Of many it is affirmed, that they had 
passed fifty years without exchanging a word with a hu- 
man creature. Some inflicted upon themselves the tor- 
tures of perpetual ulceration. 

Egypt seems to have been the centre of asceticism in 
its most terrible form; and it was therefore toward 
Egypt that the Nicene writers directed the eyes of the 
church, as to the high school of sacred wisdom. In Sy- 
ria, in Arabia, and in the mountainous regions of Asia 
Minor, especially in Pisidia and Cappadocia, a some- 
what mitigated rule of the solitary and monastic life ap- 
pears to have prevailed; the hermits building huts, com- 
paratively commodious, in the middle and liigher regions 
of the mountains; and often choosing, like Basil, the 
most delicious spots for their abode;* and admitting just 
so much relaxation of discipline, as might render this 
mode of life not altogether uninviting to those who, in 
embracing it, left behind them the racking anxieties, the 

often stated, and which no one calls in question. The only cir- 
cumstance important to our argument is this, that the extrava- 
gances often spoken of as attaching to the more recent monkery 
took their pattern from the ascetics of the Nicene age; and of 
this no one can entertain a doubt who reads Jerome, Cassian, 
AthanasiuSj Sulpitius, Palladius. and Socrates. 

* Basil, a thorough enthusiast, as to the ascetic life, paints it in 
the brightest colours: his epistles to Nazianzen might seduce 
any imaginative reader into the wilderness; if indeed he could 
fmd a wilderness such as Basil describes in a letter to his friend. 
iNaz. torn. i. p. 835. 



It RECEIVED VllOyi TH£ NICENE CiltRCH. 429 

wrongs, and the privations of common life, I'o many, 
celibacy and fasting were but a moderate price to pay 
for tranquillity, and an exemption from laborious courses, 
and dangerous services; especially if already the fervour 
of life was gone by, and if, as with many, appetite had 
been abated by disease, or early luxurious habits. 

At what time precisely, the wilderness exchanged its 
pagan for a Christian tenantry, it is not easy to ascer- 
tain. In some instances, no doubt, the very individuals 
who had begun their course as heathen gymnosophists, 
ended it as Christian anchorets. But oftener. probably, 
the deserted cell or cavern of the savage philosopher 
was taken possession of by one who, having, in the 
neighbouring cities, received the knowledge of the gos- 
pel, betook himself to the angelic life in consequence of 
persecutions, or of disappointments in love or in busi- 
ness. This is certain, that many of these solitaries 
were well acquainted with the scriptures, and must there- 
fore have passed some years in^ Christian society.* 

The coenobite institution reached its organized state in 
an irregular manner, and continued, to a late period, 
open to many anomalies. In frequent instances, those 
who professed virginity or continence, continued to re- 
side with their friends, and, in fact, lived at large, using 
their profession as a general license, or ticket of liberty, 
exempting them from the restraints which the manners 
of the age, and country, as well as the common senti- 
ments of niodesty, imposed upon women wishing still 
to be regarded by the oiher sex, as worthy to be chosen 

* The writings of Ephrem may be referred to as a sample of the 
mode of instruction usual in the monasteries, and which, what- 
ever may have been its defects, yet imbodied copious citation^ 
of scripture. Some of this writer's sermons are little more than 
jstrin^s of texts. 

37 



430 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 

as wives. In truth, the reserves to which, in the an- 
cient world, all women of the liberal class were sub- 
jected, were broken through, as on one hand by courte- 
sans, so on the other by the virgins of the church, nor 
did the circumstance of enjoying, in common with the 
former, a liberty from which others were debarred, fail 
to convey an infectious sentiment of shamelessness to 
the habits and sentiments of the latter. Who is it that 
appears in public places, unattended, unveiled, and dain- 
tily attired? Who and what is she? no, you are 

wrong in your conjecture; itis "avirginof the church."* 
The contubernium, or 'xoivofitov, offered many advan-^ 
tages to those who had renounced the business and re-- 
lationships of common life. It excluded some scandals^ 
or at least hid them. Moreover in these religious lodging 
houses, a common fund, derived in part from the church 
chest, and in part from the dedicated or sequestered or 
bequeathed property of the rich members of the society^, 
might the most easily be disturbed. The society (bro- 
therhood or sisterhood) thus assembled under one roof, 
was conveniently subjected to the daily visitations of the 
clergy, and so came under the direct authority of the 
bishop. Nor should we, in justice, omit to say, with- 
in these seclusions, the routine of religious services 
would, with the most effect, be carried on, and the rules 
of the monastic life be the best enforced. At the same 
time, those manual labours which were an important in- 
gredient of the system, could, in such houses, be ren- 
dered the most serviceable, and be made to press even- 
ly upon all, and to contribute to the support of all. 

* Farther on 1 have made a reference to Chrysostom, in rela- 
tion to the manners of the nuns, which those will turn to who 
are incredulous on the subject; and which those will gladly 
avoid, who would not infect their own minds. 



IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH. 431 

Monasteries and convents, in the modern sense of the 
terms, do not belong to the Nicene age; and it was the 
praise of the Romish church, and especially of certain 
reformers, celebrated as the founders of orders, to have 
gradually brought the irregular and scandalous practices 
of an earlier time under some wholesome restraints. 
Unquestionably the monkery of the middle ages was 
better ordered than that of the Nicene.* 

The loose, and often exaggerated style of the church 
writers, when speaking of the extent of the system 
which they so much admired, discourages the endea- 
vour to ascertain, even in a general way, the actual 
numbers of the anchorets and monks in different coun- 
tries. This number no doubt varied, from year to year, 
with the changing fortunes of the Christian body; times 
of persecution, as w^ell as of public calamity, driving 
multitudes into the wilderness who, during seasons of 
peace, would not have abandoned their places in socie- 
ty. Then again the extraordinary reputation of certain 
heroes of asceticism, or an unusual flush of the fanati- 
cal impulse, afl'ecting the church, locally or generally, 
for awhile, would operate to swell these bands, which 
might afterwards see themselves reduced (if we may 
borrow a military term) to a skeleton. 

* The reader may perhaps here recollect the comparison so 
indignantly drawn by Erasmus (Vita Hieron.) between the 
monkery of his ov/n times, and that of the times of Jerome; and 
it may appear as if this high authority contradicted what is af- 
firmed above. But in fact what Erasmus insists upon is the in- 
carceration and consequent inanity and misery and frivolity of 
the monks, his contemporaries, as compared with the license en- 
joined by those of Jerome's times. He does not say that this li- 
berty did not give room for much licentiousness. Nor, in truth, 
are his statements, in the passage referred to, borne out by the 
actual evidence. Basil and Cassian contradict him in each point 
of his encomium of the ancient monastic system. 



432 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 

Some of the Egyptian abbots are spoken of as having 
had five, seven, or even ten thousand monks under their 
personal direction; and the Thebais, as well as certain 
spots in Arabia, are reported to have been literally 
crowded with solitaries. Nearly a hundred thousand of 
all classes, it is said, were at one time to be found in 
Egypt. The western church probably could boast of no 
such swarms. This however is certain, that, although 
the enthusiasm might be at a lower ebb in one country 
than in another, it actually affected the church universal, 
so far as the extant materials of ecclesiastical history 
enable us to trace its rise and progress. These mate- 
rials, that is to say, the writings of the fathers, and the 
church historians, leave no doubt as to the prevalence of 
the ascetic system throughout the countries to which 
they themselves belonged, namely—Syria, Egypt, Ara- 
bia, Asia Minor, Thrace, Italy, Gaul, Spain, and North 
Africa. Moreover the narratives which they have fur- 
nished of the propagation of the gospel in countries re- 
mote from the shores of the Mediterranean, and beyond 
the limits of the Roman empire, make it evident that, 
in most instances, the individuals who carried the know- 
ledge of Christianity into those countries carried it un- 
der its ascetic guise.* 

* The reader may find a pertinent instance, related by Socra- 
tes, lib. i. c. 20, concerning the conversion of the Hiberians (be- 
tween the Euxine and the Caspian) who were brought over to the 
faith by the means of a Christian slave, who -- led the philoso- 
phic life," practising the ascetic discipline with the extremest 
severity. See also Sozomen, lib. ii. c. 7. Another instance of the 
same sort this writer reports, lib. iv. c. 3u, concerning the con- 
version of the Saracens. The conversion of India, under the 
direction of Athanasius, Soz. lib. ii. c. 24, we cannot doubt to 
have been effected, in the ascetic spirit. The reconversion of 
Britain, under the auspices of Gregory I. has the same charac- 
teristics 



IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH. 433 

An absolute universality of assent can scarcely be 
pretended in support of any one article of the Christian 
faith: — there have been some to oppose, or to deny al- 
most every doctrine, in its turn. What is practically 
meant by the ab omnibus is — the greater number. Or- 
thodoxy, during some eras, could by no means claim 
the majority as its adherents. As to the ascetic princi- 
ple, the assent of the church is more nearly complete 
than in most cases, and the dissidents (hereafter to be 
spoken of) were very hw. It may however be well, 
and in order to exclude exceptions, or doubts, on the 
part of those who are not conversant with church litera- 
ture, to run over the list, and summarily to report the 
suffrages of all whose testimony can be of any impor- 
tance. But in doing so, as I have had, and shall yet 
have, to cite, or to refer to particular passages in these 
same authors, all bearing on the subject of the ascetic 
institute, a general statement, such as I am sure will not 
be contradicted by any who are themselves familiar v/ith 
the patristic volumes, is all that can be needed. 

What we have now in view is not the earlier history 
of the ascetic practice, but the credit it enjoyed, and 
its universality in the Nicene age; — or, more definitely, 
during the fourth century. We need not therefore here 
go back to Tertullian, Cyprian, Origen, Dionysius, con- 
cerning whose opinions, however, there can be no ques- 
tion. 

The extant writers of this period (those not included 
of whom some fragments only remain) are not more in 
number than about twenty. We shall glance at them in 
their order. 

The first to be named, and who finished his course in 
;the last years of the third century, is Methodius, bishop 

37* 



434 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTIOIn 

of Olympus in Lycia, anti afterwards of Tyre, and a 
martyr. This writer (commended by Jerome*) speaks 
the sentiments of the church in the time of Cyprian. A 
tone of moderation distinguishes this writer; and amid 
the vagaries of an uncurbed fancy, he pays more regard 
to good sense and great principles than do many of 
higher repute. The Banquet (Symposium) of the Ten 
Virgins, assumes as true the universal opinion, that 
virginity is the highest of all excellences, and that it is 
the only way of near approach to God, which is possi- 
ble on earth .t In this writer then we find, and apart 
from the fanaticism and extravagance of the Nicene di- 
vines, that settled opinion of the ancient church from 
which sprung, inevitably and naturally, the ripe monk- 
ish system, and at length, the enforced celibacy of the 
clergy. Men of mild disposition, like Methodius, if 
they did not ^'forbid to marry," effectively restrained 
from marrying; and in fact, writings such as his were 
likely to have more influence in spreading the error, than 
those of a sterner character. It may be noticed that 
Methodius (as quoted by Theodoret) holds that lofty 
style concerning martyrdom, which we have mentioned 
as running parallel w^ith the ascetic enthusiasm. 

Lactantius, the Christian Cicero, and wlio is better 
worth the reading than most of his contemporaries, had 
far too much vigour of mind to give himself blindly to 
the extravagances common in his times; neveriheless he 
too accepts, as unquestionable, the opinion concerning 
the transcendental excellence of absolute continence; and 
lie says of one who adiieres to it, adopting the universal 
style, hie erit consimilis Deo, qui virtutem Dei cepit:J 

* Catalogue Script. Eccles. 

i As quoted by Photius, Myriob. art. 237. 

[ Lactant de Vero Cultu, lib. vi. c. 23. 



XT RECEIVED FROM THE MCENE CHURCH. ^oo 

and he affirms that continence is the height and consum- 
mation of all the virtues: he alkides also to the " plu- 
rimi," and the '' multi," who, in his times, preserved 
the " blessed and incorrupt integrity of the body," and 
who made proof of this ''celestial mode of life." At 
the same time this writer's very slender or ambiguous re- 
ference to any doctrine properly evangelic, ought to be 
noticed. Christ, in his viev;, lived and died as a pattern 
of all virtue, and tliat he might relieve men from an ex- 
cessive fear of death, and show them how to subdue the 
passions. Such, at this early time, was the cold Soci- 
nianism of too many, calling themselves Christians! 

A place among the authorities of the Nicene age ought 
<jertainly to be allowed to the council of Nice itself, and 
in connexion with our present subject, a part of its pro- 
ceedings, if we are to give credit to Socrates and Sozomen, 
demands to be noticed ; premising only an explanatory 
statement concerning the opinion of the church, as 
indicated by the decrees of preceding councils. The 
council of Ancyra, held at the commencement of the 
fourth century, had decreed,* and its decision ex- 
presses the feeling, as well as defines the practice of 
the church at the time, that, if a deacon, when he re- 
ceived ordination, made an explicit profession of his in- 
tention to marry, as being in his own case unavoidable, 
he should be permitted to do so, the bishop's license to 
that elTect screening him from future censures. But that 
if, at the time, he made no such protestation, and on the 
contrary allowed it to be supposed that he professed con- 
tinence, and yet skftervvards married, he should be re- 
moved from his ministry. What was this restricted 
permission to marry, but a virtual *' forbidding to marry?" 

* Canon 9. Routh, vol. iii. p. 410. 



436 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 

It was clearly an expression of the unfitness of tlie mar- 
ried for the sacred office, and thus an infatuated contra- 
vention of the apostolic law on this very point. I can- 
not but notice, in passing, the curious coincidence that, 
as appears from the 14th canon of this council, there were, 
at this time, some of the clergy, " priests and deacons, 
who not merely abstained from animal food, but who held 
it in such abhorrence that they would not even touch any 
vegetables that had been cooked with it. The simple 
abstinence the council allows; but condemns this ex- 
treme scrupulosity. Did not the prophetic marks at- 
tach to the ante-Nicene church?-^ 

The same council (canon 19) decreed that those who 
falsified their profession of virginity, should be numbered 
among such as had contracted a second marriage! The 
same canon prohibits the cohabiting of virgins with 
men — a custom of which we find the traces in all direc- 
tions. The nuns, thus living under the protection of 
their spiritual guardians, were denominated their *' sis- 
ters," or '' darlings," ayctTr-rtran. 

The synod of Neocaesarea, held about the same time,t 
or a little later, but before the council of Nice, decreed 
that a priest marrying, should be deposed. If this be 
not a " forbidding to marry," what are the enactments 
of Hildebrand? It is true that, at this time, and long 
afterwards, many priests, and even bishops, continued 
to live with their wives, and had children born to them, 

* There was a well understood ;7%5icaZ connexion between the 
two main articles of the ascetic life. Rigorous fasting, says 
Jerome, and none knew better than he how necessary it was in 
this respect, is indispensable to those wlio would be perfect, quod 
aliter pudicitia tuta esse non possit. Ad Eustoch. 

t RoQth, vol. iii. p. 457. A various reading in this canon 
does not affect its meaning in relation to our immediate object. 



IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH. 437 

although still apj)roaching the altar; but none (except the 
deacons who had made this express stipulation,) were 
allowed to marry after ordination.* For a second mar- 
riage, the church imposed a course of penance, more or 
less severe. 

At the council of Nice, accordinof to the accounts of 
Socrates,! and Sozomen,± who tell the same story, it 
was proposed, with a view, as it is said, to the reforma- 
tion of manners, that a rule should be established, re- 
quiring all bishops, priests, deacons, and, says the latter 
historian, subdeacons, w^ho had married before their or- 
dination, to withdraw from their wives, or cease to 
cohabit with them; and the colour of the account leads 
us to suppose that this regulation, which, in respect to 
the church universal, w^as called " a new law," although 
not new^ to several of the churches, was near to have 
been carried, and probably would have been, had not the 
good sense and right feeling of one of the bishops pre- 
sent defeated the fanaticism of the others. Paphnutius, 
a bishop of the Thebais, a confessor, having lost an eye 
in the late persecution, and himself an ascetic, rose, and 
with spirit asserted the honour and purity of matrimony, 
and insisted upon the inexpediency of any such law, 
likely as it was to bring many into a snare. For a mo- 
ment reason triumphed; the proposal was dropped, nor 
any thing farther attempted by the insane party, beyond 
the giving a fresh sanction to the established rule or tra- 
dition, otp;^ct;2ty TrapaJ'c-o-iv, that uoue should marry afler or- 
dination. 

In these facts, then, we have the evidence of a preva- 
lent, if not a universal feeling, against matrimony, as a 
pollution, and therefore, a disqualification in those who 

* Routh, p. 464, t Socr. lib. i. c. U. t Socr. lib. i. c. 23. 



438 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 

sustained office in the church. And so strong was this 
feeling with some, that it impelled them toward the 
monstrous impiety of enjoining the actual separation of 
man and wife, in direct contravention of the divine law. 
Moreover the fact (in other ways abundantly established) 
is here attested, that marriage after ordination was then, 
and had long been considered, as disgraceful and unlaw- 
ful: in other words, the ancient church had deliberately 
taken to itself the predicted mark of apostacy, by op- 
posing itself to marriage, and by actually forbidding it to 
all who desired to make proficiency in piety; and to its 
clergy — as such: — a married man might be ordained; 
but no ordained person might marry! Common sense 
resents the futility of the endeavour to draw an impor- 
tant distinction between the papacy, and the Nicene 
church, on this ground. 

It is of no importance to our present argument to fix 
the precise date of the Apostolic Constitutions. This 
spurious compilation may at least be taken as good evi- 
dence in relation to the notions and usages of the Nicene 
age, and it is manifestly intended to represent those of 
a much earlier period. This appears among many other 
instances from the description given (lib. ii. c. 2,) of the 
bishop's qualifications, who " should have, or should 
have had," a wife. The class of virgins is however 
recognised, once and again,* as a constituted order, in 
the church. The main intention of the authors or com- 
pilers of this collection being to hitch the Christian hie- 
rarchy upon the foundation of the Aaronic priesthood, 
and in fact to claim for the bishop, as Pontifex, the ut- 
most stretch of honour and of power, according to the 



* Lib. ii. cap. 25, 26, 57; lib. iii. c. 15; lib. iv. c. 14; and lib. viii. 
c. 24. 



IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH. 439 

theory which Hildebrand laboured to realize, whatever 
does not directly subserve this purpose is very lightly 
touched. That the lofty rank, and irresponsible power 
assumed for the bishop, was in fact the creation of a 
later age than the apostolic, we need no other proof than 
the incidental one, afforded by the oversight or blunder 
of the forger of these Constitutions, who, in describing 
the church (the structure) and the mode of worship,* 
betrays, little aware of what he is doing, the costume, 
so to speak, of the fourth century. Of the ill opinion 
entertained of second marriages, and of the infamy at- 
tached to a third, we find the indications.! Neverthe- 
less, and it should be remarked, the fanatical extravagance 
which attaches to the language of the great Nicene wri- 
ters, when they enter upon subjects of this class, is 
entirely avoided in the Apostolical Constitutions. In 
fact, there is far less of gnosticism, and of the ascetic 
mania, in this spurious Vv'ork, than presents itself, every 
where, on the pages of Ambrose, Basil, Chrysostom, 
and their contemporaries. It might indeed pretty fairly 
be appealed to as exhibiting the difference between the 
ancient^ and the Nicene church; the latter, rather than 
the former, being the model to which we are referred by 
the Oxford divines. 

The tenth chapter of the sixth book, enumerates, and 
condemns, the wild notions of the times, including the 
prohibition of marriage, and of animal food, which was 
then actually insisted upon by the ascetic party in the 
church. Well had it been if the ambitious divines who 
are now commended to us as our masters^ had known 
how to confine themselves to the profession of faith con- 

* Lib. ii. c. 57, and lib. viii. c. 12. 

t Lib. iii. c. 2; and especially lib, vi. c. 17, where a second mar- 
riage IS forbidden to the clergy. 



440 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 

tained in the eleventh chapter of this book; well, if even 
they could liave respected common sense, in relation to 
subjects which they were not compelled to make matter 
of piety. Let the reader compare certain passages of 
Athanasius, and Basil, cited, or referred to, above, with 
the sober propriety of the twenty-ninth chapter. But 
inasmuch as " church principles " are not to be supported 
without the aid of the divines of the fourth century, tliose 
who, by the necessity of the case, are making their ap- 
peal Xo them, involve themselves in a farther necessity 
of either disguising, or of professing, every superstition 
of thiC papacy — and among these errors, all the inherent 
extravagances of the ascetic institute. 

The accomplished Euse^bius of Cassarea, took up 
Christianity as he found it, and his evidence, in the pre- 
sent instance, merely amounts to that of a witness to the 
actual state of the church, in his times. The customary 
language of admiration in regard to religious celibacy he 
employs, without scruple;-^ speaking of the choir of 
nuns, as his contemporaries were wont to do. 

There can be no need to make new citations from 
Athanasius: I will do no more than request the reader, 
after referring to what this great and holy r.ian has writ- 
ten on the two allied subjects of virginity and fasting, 
and after listening to his credulity concerning demoniacal 
agency, to consider, with all seriousness, whether the 
scheme of piety which he so devoutly recommends, is 
not most distinctly marked with the characteristics of 
the predicted apostacy. The admission that it is so 
marked, may startle and distress some religious minds; 
for long cherished illusions are never dispelled without 

* As for instance:— Vita Constant, lib. iv. c. 26, and 28. Hist. 
Eccles. lib. ii. c. 17. 



IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH, 441 

pain, amazement, and peril. Yet what can be done, on 
the present urgent occasion, but resolutely to follow 
truth? I can imagine no plea by aid of which Paul's 
prophecy can be warded off from its manifest applica- 
tion to that ascetic institute, of which Athanasius was 
the principal patron. 

The good and superstitious Cyril of Jerusalem we 
have already referred to, as more moderate than many 
of his contemporaries: he does not, however, scruple to 
take up the usual phrases,^ in connexion with this 
subject. 

Adhering to the order of time, we pass from Palestine 
to the extreme west, and find still the same elements of 
the religious system. Hilary of Poitiers, in the places 
already referred to,t speaks the language of the times. 
He contends for that great dogma of the ascetic system, 
the perpetual virginity,^ ita venerabilis ejus ostenderetur 
in Jesu matre, virginitas: and perplexes himself with an 
allegorical exposition of Psalm cxxvii. in order to re- 
serve or assert the superior honours and blessedness of 
celibacy. 

We return from the West to the East, and mention 
next, Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis in Cyprus, of 
whom, in connexion with our present subject, it is enough 
to say that he was himself a severe ascetic, and the foun- 
der and abbot of a monastery: — ^no dissident, therefore, 
from the doctrine and practices of the Nicene church. 

Basil of Ceesarea, v/ho may be taken as a fair speci- 
men of the religious system which the fourth century 
bequeathed to the eighth and ninth, and which system 
w^e are told to accept as '* ripe Christianity," was, as 

* Catech. vi. toward the end, and xii. xvi. t P. 308. 

+ In Matth. com. canon i. 

38 



442 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 

every one knows, the great promoter of monkery in his 
times; and in fact his influence upon after ages has been 
deep and extensive. Basil " revised," would, perhaps, 
differ very little from the scheme of doctrine, worship, 
and discipline, which the Oxford divines, were they once 
set quite clear of the untoward labours of the reformers, 
would re-establish in England.* In this enumeration of 
witnesses it would be altogether superfluous to make ci- 
tations from the writings of those who are well known 
to have been the most ardent promoters of the ascetic 
practices. I therefore merely name, as coming next in 
order of time, Gregory Nazianzen, the intimate friend 
of Basil — a main pillar of that vast structure of super- 
stition and idolatry which we have been used to brand 
as popery. 

Ephrem the Syrian, who may be read with comfort 
and substantial profit, by any, bringing apostolical Chris- 
tianity with them, as an antidote, exhibits, perhaps, as 
well as any writer of the class he belongs to, the utmost 
extent to which the blind gospel of the Nicene church 
may be carried, in producing the passive virtues — pa- 
tience, self-denial, mortification of the appetites, humi- 
lity, or rather suhnissivejiess, obedience, and charity, (in 
the sense of almsgiving.) To this list may also be add- 
ed a grace for which we have no exact modern designa- 
tion — alas the poverty of a protestant church nomen- 
clature! What I mean ought not to be called heavenly- 
mindedness, for it is the condition of a soul, destitute of 
light, and warmth, and hope, and faith; but, if a term 
must be coined, we must name it — unearthly-minded- 

* Those who will soon be reading the " select " treatises of this^ 
father, will be virtually misled and imposed upon, unless they 
look into his entire works. 



IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH. 443 

ness$ for it was the contrary of sensuality, covetous- 
ness, and turbulent passion; and yet not the genuine and 
efficacious opponent of the sordid principles of our na- , 
ture. In naming Ephrem, I cannot but caution the read- 
er against the delusion which may be practised upon him 
by *' selections." At this urgent moment, when the 
church is fearfully vibrating between apostolic Christia- 
nity and the Nicene superstitions, nothing can be of any 
avail but an appeal to the historical apparatus entire^ 
whence alone true notions of things may be derived. 
Selections are schooled witnesses, and therefore worse 
than none, 

Gregory of Nyssa, the brother of Basil, and, although 
a married bishop, yet so ardent an admirer of celibacy, 
that one is apt to think his wife must have been a very 
Xantippe. In this writer may be found more than the 
germs of every abomination of the papacy. Let it be 
granted that, in extravagance of expression, he goes a 
little beyond some of his contemporaries; but yet is he, 
in no point of superstition or fanaticism, at variance with 
them. His scheme of doctrine and discipline is only 
Nicene Christianity, vividly expressed; or, as one might 
say, the same outline of things in bas-relief. Now I 
would gladly receive an ingenuous reply to these follow- 
ing plain questions:— 

1st. Putting aside the mere ecclesiastical question of 
the pretensions of the bishop of Rome, can any broad 
and intelligible distinction be established between Gre- 
gory Nyssen and the Romanism or popery of the tenth 
century? 

2d. Can any important distinction be made good be- 
tween this father and his contemporaries, particularly 
Basil, Athanasius, and Ambrose? 

3d. And this question I would humbly and seriously 



444 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 

address to men fearing God, (and competently informed,) 
Whether each article of Paul's explicit prediction of the 
coming apostacy does not find its pointed and complete 
fulfilment in the system wliich this writer's works ira- 
body? 

I can imagine several modes in which these questions 
might be evaded, or, *' a case made out," very learnedly 
and ingeniously, and miich to the satisfaction of all who 
love to be excused the toils of investigation, and which 
should appear to dispose of the difficulty, and of him 
who starts it; but I am thoroughly persuaded that, dealt 
with apart from prejudice and controversial influences, 
they can be replied to only in one manner, and in a 
way fatal to the illusion which is now spreading within 
the protestant church. I abstain from advancing any 
challenge in this instance; but will merely recommend 
the conscientious student to read and ponder — Gregory 
Nyssen, and then to ask himself, whither he will be 
tending in surrendering himself to the Nicene divines 
or — to those who have made the Nicene divines their 
masters. 

Ambrose of Milan, the best authority in support of 
^^ church principles," and in recommendation of — the 
virtues of relics — the advocacy of the saints — the celes- 
tial excellence of virginity — the efficacy of fasting, and 
other works of penance, and of what you please of the 
trumpery of the Nicene and popish superstition. In 
writing to Pope Syricius, Ambrose submissively says — 
quos sanctitas tua damnavit, scias apud nos secundum 
judicium tuum esse damnatos.* Well is it for the Lord's 
people that they are to receive their award from other 
lips; but Ambrose might have added, '* and whatever 
your holiness approves at Rome, we approve also at 

** Epist. 42. class i. 



IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH. 446} 

Milan," In fact, he gave all his soul, and devoted his 
eminent talents to the work of upholding the church sys- 
tem of his times — most zealous, when most in the wrong. 
I have ah'eady, and must again cite him in the course of 
this argument. 

The erudite Jerome stands next on our list of witnesses. 
It may be permitted to Erasmus,* while indignantly com* 
paring the sottish and vapid monkery of his own times, 
with the ascetic system of the Nicene age, to say, mo- 
nachi institutum, quod ne quis in hoc erret, id temporis 
longe diversum erat ab hoc quod hodie videmus. Let it 
be that there was a difference in circumstance, between 
the two systems; but assuredly not in substance; and 
whoever looks into this great writer's ascetic treatises 
and epistles, will grant, that on all points of the predicted 
apostacy, Jerome carried his notions to the highest pitch 
of extravagance: but of this more presently. Yet let us 
notice, in passing, a signal instance of that perversion of 
all genuine moral sentiments — a perversion fatal to the 
virtue of youth, which attended the universal notion of 
the celestial merit of virginity. A youth, religiously 
educated, and religiously disposed, overcome by tempta- 
tion, falls into some licentiousness of conduct: what then 
are the feelings which should attend his recovery to vir- 
tue?— sorrow surely, and shame, in recollection of his 
sill. It was altoofether another thino^ with the ascetic 
Jerome, who, in his own case, deplores, not the sin of 
his early fall, but his loss of caste among the terrestrial 
seraphs, and his having forfeited those ineffable honours 
of which others might make their boast! Jerome's lan- 
guage, in this instance, carries with it a volume of mean- 
ing in relation to the real quality of Nicene Christianity. 
I commend the passage to the reader's particular atten- 

^ In the life of Jerome above referred to. 

38- 



446 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 

tion, and shall cite his own words.* After protesting 
that he does not condemn matrimony, he says— Virgi- 
nitatem aiitem in coelum fero, non quia habeam, sed 
quod magis mirer quod non habeo. Ingenua et vere- 
cunda confessio est; quo ipse careas, id in aliis praedi- 
care. Nunquid, quia gravi corpore terrae hasreo, avium 
non miror volatus, nee colurnbam praedico, quod radit 
iter liquidum, celeres neque commovet alas? Notions of 
this sophisticated sort, are of similar tendency to those 
substitutions of the law of honour, for the rules of vir- 
tue, \vhich in fact give a license to every immorality that 
does not happen to be touched by the penalties of this 
arbitrary code. Jerom'e must take his place among the 
foremost promoters of the false principles of the Nicene 
church system. 

Mark, the hermit, might be cited along with Macarius 
the Egyptian, as affording evidence of the consolatory 
fact that good sense and spirituality still h^ld a place, 
even among the ascetics: an ascetic, however, he is, and 
moreover a, mystic, going far toward the oriental illusion 
and its pantheism. 

Differ as much as they might on other points, these 
great writers are unanimous on the subject of the ascetic 
doctrine: thus Rufinus, while rending his friend Jerome's 
reputation, with merciless asperity, is as stanch a monk 
as he, or as any of his contemporaries. 

And so again Augustine, although he claims to be set 
off from his contemporaries, on various accounts, never- 
theless holds firmly to the catholic doctrine, on this 
ground; nor can a more striking, or a more edifying in- 
stance be adduced, of the sovereign influence of religious 
illusions, in perverting the strongest and the soundest 

*" Apologia ad Pammach. toward the end. 



IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH. 447 

minds. If any are staggered by Augustine's authority in 
this instance, and are inclined by it to think well of what 
otherwise they would not hesitate to condemn, let them 
remember that this same eminent father favours, and 
warmly defends, each principal article of the supersti- 
tion of his times, and has been, and may fairly be cited, 
by Romanists, in support of almost every element of the 
papal system. 

I will not, however, dismiss Augustine without refer- 
ring the reader to a passage in which, by nice distinc- 
tions, he labours to set the church clear from the marks 
of the predicted apostacy.* Ille enim prohibet, qui 
hoc malum esse dicit, non qui huic bono aliud melius 
anteponit. True, the church catholic did not forbid 
marriage, like certain heretics, universally, or as in it- 
self abominable; but it did absolutely forbid it to all 
who aspired to walk on the path of what it repre- 
sented as the only Christian perfection: it did abso- 
lutely (or so far as it could) forbid marriage to all men 
in orders: it discouraged the ordination of the mar- 
ried: it spoke of a second marriage as adultery; and, in a 
word, it universally and uniformly taught a doctrine, and 
sanctioned a practice, from which nothing else could re- 
sult but that horrible prohibition of marriage, by the 
Komish church, which, during a long course of ages, has 
deluged Europe with licentiousness and misery. Let 
it be temperately asked whether the Romish church has 
assumed any general principle, in relation to the celibacy 
of the monastic orders, or of the clergy, which is not to 
be found distinctly advanced, and warmly defended, by 
Augustine himself. If not (and no one w^ill affirm that 
it did) then it is equally unjust and frivolous to make a 

" Contra Faust, lib. xxx. c. 6, 



448 THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, AND THE SANCTION 

distinction between the papacy and the Nicene church, 
in respect to this mark of apostacy. 

All that has been said of Augustine, is true of his il- 
lustrious contemporary Chrysostom. We have heard 
him using language, in regard both to virginity and fast- 
ing, such as is not surpassed in extravagance, or in per- 
nicious tendency, by any popish writer. 

No important accession to our present argument would 
be secured by passing forward into the fifth century, or 
by adducing ihe train of secondary writers who mark 
the course of it. Every one knows what their tendency 
is, as to the points in question. But, if the reader 
pleases, let him look into Sulpitius Severus, (the bio- 
grapher of St. Martin,) or into the church historians, 
Socrates, Sozomen, Theodoret; or into Palladius, Isi- 
dore, Cassian, or Cyril of Alexandria. 

Whether the writers above enumerated belong to the 
eastern or to the western, to the north African, or to 
the Alexandrian churches, they hold the same language, 
and seem to emulate each other in their zeal to promote 
every one of those notions and practices which, when 
digested into canons, decrees, or ecclesiastical usages, 
make up what we mean by popery, or Romanism, as 
the system adopted and enforced by the papacy. 

By protestants it has always been admitted, as it has 
always been felt by the Romish church herself, that the 
monastic orders are the strength of the system; and it 
was the monks who were the most determined oppo- 
nents of the reformation. If, then, protestants still think 
as the reformers did, and as they themselves have been 
used to do, of the papacy, as an "apostacy," and as a 
system of cruelty, corruption, and illusion, the monkery 
which has always been the darling of this church, and 
its main support, must take an ample share of the repro- 



IT RECEIVED FROM THE NICENE CHURCH. 449 

bation with which we regard the papal system. What 
then is our dilemma? This same monkery, reprobated 
as a principal element of popery, traces itself up to the 
Nicene church, and glows in a false splendour upon the 
pages of every one of the great writers of the Nicene 
acre. We ou^ht, then, either to embrace asceticism, on 
the ground of this ** catholic consent," and so to re- 
nounce the reformation; or, adhering to the reformation, 
to disown the Nicene fathers. There is no consistency 
in a middle course; nor can there be coherence in a sys- 
tem which would bind in the same bundle the two op- 
posed authorities. 



THE OPPOSITION MADE TO THE ANCIENT 
ASCETICISM. 

Whether at all, or, to what extent, if at all, the pre- 
valent ascetic doctrine and practice were opposed by any 
individuals, or parties, within the pale of the church, al- 
though a point of some importance in itself, is not es- 
sential to our present argument; I shall, however, devote 
a page or two to the subject, for the purpose of excluding 
any probable exceptions; but must request that the bear- 
ing of it upon our inquiry concerning the deference that 
is due to Christian antiquity, may not be lost sight of. 
The case then stands thus. — 

It has been frankly acknowledged by the advocates of 
*« church principles," that they are barely indicated, if so 
much, in the canonical scriptures: and that they can 
never be satisfactorily sustained without the aid of the 
Nicene writers. This being admitted, we may suppose 



450 THE OPPOSITION MADE 

an opponent to say, as a demur to the conclusion toward 
which I am tending, "It may be true that the writers 
who have been cited did express themselves too warmly, 
and with too little caution, on the subject of celibacy, 
and the e:5^cellence of the ascetic life; but there is good 
reason to think that, in doing so, they outran the ge- 
neral feeling of the church: in fact, indications may be 
gathered of the existence of a contrary opinion and feel- 
ing." 

Be it so; and would that it had been so to a far greater 
extent than we are at liberty to assume. But then, in 
what position do we place the extant church writers, 
one and all; and what will be the value of their evidence 
in establishing church principles? If indeed these wri- 
ters — that is to say, all who have come down to modern 
times, or all who are usually appealed to as authorities, 
in support of these principles, were in fact maddened 
by the ascetic phrensy, and if, under its influence, they 
forgot moderation, and virtually belied, or greatly over- 
stated the general sentiment of the church, in their 
times; then, how can we venture to rely upon them, as 
our guides, in relation to those other church doctrines, 
such as the intrinsic efficacy of the sacraments, and the 
high bearing of the sacerdotal office, in relation to which 
the inducements were manifest and strong to overstep 
the limits of sobriety? 

If, after all, the holy catholic church of the Nicene age, 
that is to say, the mass of Christians, was much more 
moderate and sound than we should suppose, in looking 
into the fathers (a most comfortable supposition, truly!) 
then it follows, that, in yielding ourselves to the gui- 
dance of these writers, we make ourselves the dupes of 
their personal enlhiisiasm and folly; and are just so far, 
and to that extent, led astray from what we are profess^ 
ing to admire, namely, " catholic purity." Most clearly, 



TO THE ANCIENT ASCETICISM. 451 

the fathers, without whose aid, as it is confessed, church 
principles are not to be established, can be safely re- 
sorted to only on the strength of the contrary supposi- 
tion, that they themselves were in harmony with the 
church of their times, and did truly represent its opi- 
nions, feelings, and practices. 

But on the other hand, if (and as in fact is evident) 
the extant church writers did speak the mind of the great 
mass of Christians in their times, though not absolutely 
of all, and if, in the main, a true notion of the feelings 
and usages of the church catholic, be gathered from 
these remains, and if genuine church principles are iin- 
bodied in the writings of Ambrose, Athanasius, Basil, 
and their contemporaries, then, without a question, the 
ascetic doctrine and practice— -that is to say Monkery, 
with its illusions, its frivolity, its pretensions, and its 
corruptions, was a principal and a darling element of this 
catholic system; and then moreover, if, on the authority 
of the Nicene fathers, the modern church is to adopt 
principles and practices which can in no other manner 
be sustained, there can be no consistency in rejecting^ 
(merely because we may not happen to like it) its fully- 
sanctioned ascetic system. Let us repress, if we can, 
the abuses to which that system has always been openf 
but the institute itself, with the doctrines on which it 
rests, wants no sanction on the part of the authority to 
which, in other matters, we are religiously bowing. 

Take it then either way, our inference is saved. — If 
the ascetic mania was in fact more generally opposed 
than we have imagined it to have been, then the fathers^ 
are delusive guides, in regard to church principles; and 
they are especially to be suspected when they are known 
to have been exposed to the influence of powerful motives? 
for running into extravagance. But if such opposition wa^ 



452 THE OPPOSITION JIADE 

in fact of small amount, and if the church catholic went 
all the length of its teachers, then this churcli catholic — 
people and leaders, together, — was the victim of a sys- 
tem, which we must think false in principle, and fatal in 
its operation, and such as vitiates whatever it is min- 
gled with. An opponent may take which alternative he 
pleases. 

It may be gathered from the language of Chrysostom, 
on several occasions,* that objections were raised against 
the prevailing practices by, probably, the laxer sort of 
professed Christians; and, also, that more than a (ew, 
in and out of the church, were accustomed to make a 
jest of the enormous follies, and the hypocrisy, and the 
shameless abuses, v/hich disgraced the monkish system.t 
It cannot be imagined that in any age, or whatever may 
be the influence of the promoters of fanaticism, the com- 
mon sense of mankind should be entirely overpowered, 
or that absolute silence should be imposed upon either 
the remonstrance of the wise, or the ribaldry of the pro- 
fane. All the terrors of Kome, in the height of her 
pride, did not avail to protect the monks and the monas- 
teries from the rebuke and contempt which they de- 
served. 

In fact, the existence of a somewhat formidable op- 
position, and the prevalence of a whispered contempt, 
might be inferred from that very style of extravagance 

** Tom. i. p. 328, and the Treatise against the Impugners of 
the Monastic Life, passim. 

t We may easily imagine what would be said and thought by 
the people at large, when the monks were seen, in open church, 
and during the celebration of the "terrible mysteries," to be 
proffering all sorts of gallant attentions to the ladies, their com- 
panions. See the passage from which I have already cited some 
sentences, tom. i. p. 2137. 



TO THE ANCIENT ASCETICISM. 453 

in which the church writers indulge. Men of sense, 
unless provoketl, and alarmed, do not often run so far 
npon a road where they are sure to be outdone by fools. 
There were, in fact, some serious protests made, from 
time to time, against the wide-spread infatuation of the 
general church; and we find each of its culpable super- 
stitions on the one side, branded with merited reproba- 
tion, and, on the other, passionately defended by per- 
verse ingenuity. But in each case the church catholic 
proved itself too strong for the dissidents, who were 
cursed, borne down, banished, crushed; and so the goodly 
structure of artificial piety was preserved from injury, 
and safely handed down to succeeding ages. Unhappily 
the protesting party, in these several instances, and the 
same is true, more or less, of every protest against pope* 
ry, down to the time of Luther, took the obvious, but the 
ineffective course, of inveighing against the particular 
superstitions of the church; the objectors themselves, 
probably, not being conscious of that fatal departure 
from the first principles of Christianity whence all these 
errors had resulted. Luther, on the contrary, steadily 
held on his way, and actually brought about a reforma- 
tion, because (divinely taught) he felt the apostacy of 
the church from the gospel, long before he had learned 
to disapprove of the prevalent superstitions; and he an- 
nounced to the world the life-giving truth which the 
church had long lost sight of, while yet he himself sub- 
missively bowed before the papal chair. 

Jovinian, Vigilantius, and others, upon whom Jerome, 
Ambrose, and Augustine trampled, do not appear to have 
understood tlie secret reason of the errors they de- 
nounced. We should think so, judging merely from the 
failure of their endeavours to promote reform. What 

39 



454 THE OPPOSITION MADE 

their actual opinions were, is not to be ascertained; for 
we possess no evidence better than the reports of their 
malignant and triumphant antagonists, to confide in 
whom, in such a case, woukl be something worse than 
credulity; for it would involve a cruel injustice toward 
men who, by their very persecutors, have been denied 
the opportunity of appealing to the candour of posterity. 
The personal character of Jovinian, were it known, 
might enable us to form a better opinion of his doctrine: 
it would not, perhaps, be altogether safe to interpret the 
calumnies of his enemies, as so many testimonies to his 
virtue and piety. Nothing, however, contradicts the 
supposition that he honestly and religiously opposed the 
madness of his times: at least he did so courageously, 
and he suffered the consequence; for, having been eccle- 
siastically condemned at Rome, and Milan, he was a- 
villy banished to a desolate island, where he ended his 
days. 

In nearly the same path followed Vigilantius, who had 
been sustained, as it appears, by certain bishops. Proh 
nefas! exclaims the sanctimonious Jerome,* si tamen 
episcopi nominandi sunt, qui non ordinant diaconos, 

nisi prius There were therefore some, and it is 

a consoling thought, who, notwithstanding the rabid 
asceticism of the church at large, adhered at once to 
common sense, and to the apostolic injunction, and who, 
knowing the peculiar temptations to which the clergy 
were exposed (especially in consequence of the easy 

* Jerome's Epistles, and Treatise, against Jovinian and Vigi- 
lantius, as they arc not very long, will no doubt be read, or at 
least cursorily examined by the reader who has access to his 
works. This comprehensive reference may therefore be enough, 
on the present occasion. The Epistle to Vigilantius, particular- 
ly, deserves a perusal. 



TO THE ANCIENT ASCETICISM. 455 

access allowed them to convents) wisely required that 
those whom they ordained should be married men. It 
was on tills very account, and precisely because these 
bishops paid respect to the commandments of God, dis- 
regarding the foolish and wicked traditions of men, that 
this crabbed monk grinds his teeth at them, and would 
fain have stripped them of their dignities. 

It does not appear, as I have already said, that Vigi- 
lantius, any more than Jovinian (or than later reformers, 
before the sixteenth century) knew how to lay the axe 
to the root of the superstitions of his times, by insisting 
upon those great principles of Christianity, wbich, when 
understood, exclude these follies in a mass, as by the 
force of an inherent energy, repelling whatever springs 
from another source. His protest therefore, although 
calm, reasonable, and not unsupported, died away; his 
party was crushed, and the doctors who trampled the 
remonstrants under their feet, had the satisfaction, in 
leaving the world, to see the ship of the church,* in full 
sail, gaily decked with all the fool's colours and taw^dry 
tatters which human wit could devise, and making its 
way, in gallant bearing, by favour of wind and tide, to- 
ward the haven which it at length reached under the 
pilotage of the Gregorys, and the Innocents of Rome. 
Jerome may fairly claim the praise of having sealed the 
fate of Christianity, for a thousand years, by the influ- 
ence of his pernicious pen; and especially in crushing, 
as he had done, the rising tendency toward reformation. 
How different might have been the history of Europe, 
how different the spiritual condition and /a^e (if the word 
may be used,) of millions of mankind, if this learned 
and able writer—commanding the ear of the church, 

* Constit. Apost. lib, ii. c. 57. 



456 THE OPPOSITION MADE 

eastern and western, had only once given place to a 
modest and religious doubt, as to the soundness of the 
prevailing notions. If, instead of heaping execrable 
scurrilities upon the heads of Jovinian and Vigilantius, 
he had mildly considered their remonstrances, and con- 
sented to look into the scriptures, to see '* if these things 
were so," a new era might have opened upon the church. 
Alas! Jerome, the great apostle and pillar of '* church 
principjes," was conscious of no feelings, as a disputant, 
and when irritated, but those of a Torquemada! 

But although these remonstrants, and others, did not, 
so far as appears, touch the spring of all superstition, 
they fully understood the oneness and consistency of 
the manifold inventions that had been heaped upon the 
church; and they felt that it was a living mass, con- 
nected by fibres, not to be severed without affecting the 
whole. Along with many diversities of opinion, a very 
remarkable agreement is to be observed, as to this point, 
among the remonstrants who, in succession, have as- 
sailed the prevailing corruptions of the church, from 
Jovinian, down to Luther, and this intimate connexion 
has been well understood on the other side; and, from 
Jerome, down to cardinal Cadjetan and Tetzel, all have 
thoroughly known that, to amputate a limb of this body 
of superstition, was nothing else than to leave the whole 
to bleed to death. Our modern revivers of church prin- 
ciples, too, give indications enough of their consciousness 
of this harmony of the ancient notions and practices; and 
they are therefore restoring, one by one, all the parts 
and members of the Nicene church system. 

* Occasions such as those now before us, I mean the 
remonstrances which Ambrose, Syricius, and Jerome, 
united their efforts to crush, offer the means of applying 
a very satisfactory criterion to our own religious dispo- 



TO THE ANCIENT ASCETICISM. 457 

«itions, individually, and I beg leave to avail myself of 
this criterion, as follows — 

There are a few signal scenes in history, while con- 
templating which, every one's sympathies kindle, and 
pass over, entire, or nearly so, to the one side, or to the 
other:— our instinctive emotions, the momentary pro- 
ducts of our characteristic dispositions, involuntarily wake 
lip, and choose their part: — we declare ourselves Greeks 
or Trojans, w-hether we will or not. iVnd there is rea- 
son in such instinctive movements. It may indeed be 
very true that, when we come to look narrowly into the 
personal qualities or private worth of the actors, in such 
critical scenes, there may appear to be a balance of 
merits; or at least all merit may not be on the one side, 
nor all demerit on the other. And farther, if the inte- 
rests in debate are coolly and minutely examined, a 
candid observer may be compelled to acknowledge that 
there is, between the antagonists, a sort of partition, or 
breaking up of truth and error; it is not always, nor 
often, as it was when Copernicus and the church were 
debating concerning the solar system, that the one side 
is absolutely right, and the other is absolutely wrong. 

Nevertheless, after all such allowances have been 

made, we impatiently return to the scene of action, and, 

without hesitation, resume our seats, on the one side, or 

on the other, of the stage, and give our chosen champion 

our hearts and prayers. Thus, for an example, a good 

Romanist looks on while the heretics, John Huss, and 

his disciple, are being consigned to the compassion of 

the civil power, to be dealt with as they may deserve: 

and so again, such a one waits to hear the incorrigible 

monk of Wittenberg sentenced to the flames, by Charles 

and his reverend assessors, at Worms; and sighs to 

think that the church was then defrauded of her revenge. 

39* 



458 THE OPPOSITION MADE 

Now let any one lake in hand Jerome's famous (infa- 
mous) letter to Vigilantius, and he will soon find toward 
which side his involuntary sympathies are tending. And 
let him not be prejudiced against ''church principles" 
by the revolting malignity which breathes through every 
line of this episde:* — let Jerome's venom on the one 
side, and, on the other, the apparent mildness and rea- 
sonableness which distinguish the (ew sentences quoted 
from Vigilantius be put out of view, and then, looking 
at the mere controversy between the two men (the wolf 
and the lamb) let him choose his part. On the one side 



* The few sentences quoted by Jerome from Vigilantius, con- 
tain nothing that is offensive; and we may be pretty sure that, 
had there been any thing of this kind, it would have been ad- 
duced by his irritated adversary. On the contrary, his own two 
epistles, 59 and 60, cannot be read without the liveliest disgust: — 
they are the vigorous expression of the worst sentiments to which 
human nature is liable. Either to utter or to hear what Vigilan- 
tius had advanced, Jerome assures us, is "a sacrilege." He, 
better called Dormitantius, than Vigilantius, had opened his 
fetid mouth, fraught with a putrid stench, against the relics and 
ashes of the martyrs. He is a Samaritan, and a Jew, and a mad- 
man, disgorging a filthy surfeit. He is a useless vessel, which 
should have been shivered by the iron rod of apostolic authority. 
A tongue, he had, fit only to be cut out. He is a maniac, a por- 
tent, and one who well deserves with Ananias, Sapphira, and 
Simon Magus, to be consigned to eternal darkness — non est cru- 
delitas pro Deo, sed pietas. Vigilantius is — a dog, a monster, a 
servant of the devil, a blasphemer, and of course, a heretic, as 
well as an ass, a fool, a sot, a glutton, a dreamer. — What! shall 
we listen to such a one, and then be compelled to condemn all 
the fathers — all the bishops — all Christian people, and all Chris- 
tian princes ? for all, says Jerome, have authorized, and approved 
and practised what Vigilantius condemns! This was very nearly 
true, and it was also true that the quod ab omnibus, was a mass 
of foolish and pestilent superstitions. The reader who has Jerome 
«t hand, will doubtless peruse these epistles. 



TO THE ANCIENT ASCETICISM. 459 

there are church principles, such as — the merits of holy- 
virginity — the godly usage of pilgrimages to the tombs 
of the martyrs — the reverence, if not worship, due to 
the relics, and the images of the saints — the interces- 
sory power of the saints in heaven — the expediency of 
the flambeau church vigils, and, in a word, all the prin- 
cipal articles of later and modern Romanism. Then on 
the other side there is a calm remonstrance against these 
practices and notions, founded on an appeal to scripture, 
and to the experience which the church had had of the 
ill tendency of all such usages. 

Looking, then, at this controversy broadly, and with- 
out attempting to mince the particulars, or to make out 
fifty nice exceptions, let every one ingenuously say — 
was Jerome right, or was Vigilantius right? What is 
the verdict of our consciences? Was it well for the 
church that Jerome triumphed, or might it have been 
well if Vigilantius had been listened to? But before we 
reply, let us look to the consequences of our decision as 
aflecting ourselves. If Jerome was in the right, and 
Vigilantius in the wrong, then WicklifF was wrong, and 
Huss was wrong, and Jerome of Prague was wrong, and 
Luther was wrong, and the English reformers, the foun- 
ders of the protestant church in this country, were wrong; 
for all, in their turn, held substantially the same lan- 
guage, and the last named have left on record a protest, 
couched in language far more animated and severe than 
Vigilantius ventured to employ, against the very super- 
stitions which he called in question.* 

But now, if in thus looking at this controversy of 

* It cannot be necessary to remind the clerical reader of the 
terms employed by the authors of the Homilies, when speaking 
of these same superstitions. 



460 THE OPPOSITION MADE 

fourteen hundred years, concerning certain principles 
and observances, on the one side pretended to be godly 
and edifying, and on the other affirmed to be fatal, and 
subversive of Christianity — if, in so considering it, we 
decide that the English reformers, and that Luther, and 
WicklifF, and Huss, and Vigilantius, were right, then 
after taking this side of the argument, in what position 
do we find ourselves to be placed in regard to the Ni- 
cene church? I will boldly say that any attempt to 
draw an arbitrary line of distinction somewhere between 
the later reformers, and the remonstrants of Jerome's 
time, merely with the view of saving the Nicene church, 
would be equally frivolous, disingenuous, and unavail- 
ing; nor can I imagine that any such attempt will be 
made by honest and well informed men. Common 
sense rejects the endeavour to distinguish between things 
so nearly the same. 

Disregarding then any such futile plea of exception, 
the Nicene church, with Jerome as its worthy repre- 
sentative and advocate, is seen to range along with the 
papacy, as the zealous and devoted admirer and patron- 
ess of SUPERSTITION, and as the intolerant and infatuated 
opponent of the authority of scripture. 

Let it be imagined, however, that some persons, dif- 
fident of the guidance of common sense, and foresee- 
ing the far-siretching consequences that must follow 
from a decision against Jerome, in this instance, will 
hold to the belief — a belief that they will not choose 
narrowly to scrutinize, that, after all, and although he 
might indulge a bad temper, and might go too far, he 
was nevertheless, in the main, right, and should be 
thought of gratefully, as having upheld '* godly usages, 
and discipline," against the liberalism of his times. Be 
it so: but let us take care not to violate historical justice. 



TO THE ANCIENT' ASCETICISM. 461 

Now, when we open the monkish legends of the middle 
ages, and find them crammed with revolting absurdities, 
such as almost sicken us of human nature, and bring 
our best convictions into peril, we do not hesitate to 
say — *' Whatever this ascetic system might have been in 
its bright days, it had evidently got so far wrong, in 
these later times, as at once to paralyze the understand- 
ings, and to vitiate the moral sentiments, and to caute- 
rize the consciences, of those who came under its in- 
fluence." Thus we make our escape from the humi- 
liating scene. But what if it shall appear that the 
monkery of the darkest ages does not surpass, a whit, in 
folly, extravagance, and moral ulceration, that of the 
times to which we have been used, inconsiderately, to 
attribute wisdom and purity? And what if this always- 
vicious system shall be found to have shed its corrupt- 
ing and stultifying influence over even the most power- 
ful, and the most accomplished minds? Shall we not at 
length be convinced that the entire scheme was of evil 
quality, when we find a man like Jerome, to be affected, 
from head to foot, with the '''putrefying sores" of this 
spiritual scrofula? 

The task of reporting Jerome's ineffable absurdities, 
just as they stand, without compromising the sacred 
things with which he mixes them, is indeed a difficult 
one; but I must attempt it, taking refuge under St. Ber- 
nard's axiom — melius est utscandalum oriatur, quam Ve- 
ritas relinquatur. 

The '* Patriarch of Monks," who has been so often 
referred to in these pages, and who was adored, almost, 
by the Nicene church, and held up (as we have seen) 
as a pattern of Christian perfection by Athanasius, had 
been, it seems, in danger, at one time, of thinking too 
highly of his own incomparable merits. Haec in men- 



462 THE OPPOSITION MADE 

turn ejus cogitalio incidit, nullum ultra se perfectum 
monachum in eremo consedisse. And, for his humilia- 
tion, it was revealed to him that the unexplored depths 
of the wilderness had long hidden, from the view of 
mortals, a solitary, surpassing himself in the ascetic vir- 
tues, as far as he surpassed the generality of his order. 
He was therefore commanded to leave his monastery, 
and to go in quest of this immaculate pattern of sancti- 
ty. It was in his ninetieth year that he thus set out, 
propping his tottering frame upon a staff, and not know- 
ing toward what quarter to direct his steps. Fainting 
under the fervours of noon, yet nothing doubting of his 
course, what should meet his eyes but — a centaur — a 
creature half man, half horse, quo viso, salutaris impres- 
sione signi armat frontem (what good catholic would 
not have crossed himself at such a sight!) The beast, 
however, was found to be more obliging in temper than 
might have been expected, and in reply to the saint's 
inquiry — " Whereabouts does the servant of God live?" 
he courteously pointed to the desired path, and then gal- 
loped off with the swiftness of a bird! The learned Je- 
rome does not attempt to solve the weighty question, 
whether this centaur was a mere guise of the devil, or a 
real and substantial son of the wilderness. Be that as 
it might, St. Antony held on his way; but he had gone 
only a few steps farther, when lo! he beheld, in a rocky 
glen, a negro-snouted urchin, whose forehead budded 
horns, while his inferior parts were those of a goat; in a 
word, it was a genuine satyr! St. Antony, scutum fidei, 
et loricum spei, ut bonus praeliator arripuit. Another 
friend, however, (whether beast or devil) presents himself 
under this ambiguous form; and one who was gifted, not 
merely with urbanity, and with the faculty of speech, 
but with reason and truth: — mortalis ego sum, et unus 



TO THE ANCIENT ASCETICISM. 46S 

ex accolis eremi, qiios vario delusa errore gentilitas, fau- 
nos, satyrosque et incubos vocans colit. To exclude the 
incredulity of his readers, Jerome assures them that an an- 
imal of this very species, which had been brought alive to 
Alexandria, had been sent in pickle to Antioch, where 
it had been examined by the emperor. We must how- 
ever cut short our story, and bring the holy monk to the 
cave of the still holier Paul, an eremite indeed, wdio, 
utterly, and long forgotten by man, had passed nearly a 
century in this seclusion, clad only with a wisp of the 
leaves of the palm tree, which also, during forty years, 
had supplied him with his only diet; since the failing of 
which he had received a ration of bread, daily, like Eli- 
jah, from heaven. Long did St. Antony knock, and 
earnestly did he pray before he could gain admittance. 
" Qui bestias recipis," said he, *' hominem cur repellis? 
.... Quod si non impetro, hie moriar ante postes 
tuos: certe sepelies vel meum cadaver!" The door 
opens at this appeal, and nothing could be more sweet 
than the greetings and the discourse of the two ancho- 
rets. While chatting, a crow perches on the branch of 
a neighbouring tree, and then lays a whole loaf on the 
table; integrum panum ante ora mirantium deposuit! 
Now it seems that, for sixty years or more, this same 
almoner had brought the hermit, daily, half a loaf; but 
this day, a ivhoh loaf I Dominus nobis prandium misit 
. . . . mililibus suis duplicavit annonam ! But now who 
should have the honour of splitting it in two? Long 
and ingeniously was this difficulty discussed, when at 
length it was agreed that, each holding his part, they 
should break it by their conjoined efforts! The reader 
should be told that all these edifying incidents are gar- 
nished with texts of scripture, which I must take the li- 
berty to omit. 



454 THE OPPOSITION MADE 

Again, to cut short our instructive narrative, v;e must 
briefly say that the hermit Paul, knowing that his own 
departure was at hand, enjoined St. Antony to fulfil the 
functions of his undertaker, and sexton, and executor; 
but first desired that he would return whence he came, 
and fetch, from his monastery, the pallium, given him 
by Athanasius, and wherein he would fain be wrapped 
for interment. Antony complies, retraces his weary way, 
with all speed, seizes the cloak, and returns breathless, 
fearing lest he should be too late to discharge the last 
offices to his dying friend. On his way he beholds a 
heavenly choir of prophets and apostles, and among 
them, the departed Paul, in snow-white robes! Too 
true a portent! The hermit had already breathed his 
last when St. Antony reached the cavern. After in- 
dulging his grief awhile, he bethinks himself of the du-^ 
ties of his office; but here comes the staggering diffi- 
culty! how shall he dig the grave, having neither spade 
nor shovel? While much perplexed, and well nigh in 
despair — Moriar ut dignum est. What should he see 
but a pair of lions scouring the hills, who, approaching 
the spot, and coming up to the corpse, signified, by many 
blandishments, and by wagging their tails, their sympa- 
thy wdth the saint, on the sad occasion: nor was this all; 
for they forthwith most humanely set about digging a 
grave for the defunct; and, strange to say — as exact to 
the measure, as the most expert sexton could have done 
it! unius hominis capacem locum foderunt; and then, 
having finished their task, and looking for their hire, 
they threw back their ears, licking St. Antony's hands 
and his feet: — at ille animadvertit benedictionem eos a se 
precari! — nor did the saint refuse them a remuneration so 
well earned: — blessed lions! We may leave them then, 
and him, to conclude the obsequies as they can, and 



TO THE ANCIENT ASCETICISM. 465 

shall here cut short the legend. Is it enough; or need 
we adduce more of like quality from the same great doc- 
tor's other ascetic memoirs?'^ 

I do not ask whether the above savours of truth and 
piety and reason, a question which would be insulting 
to tlie reader, but whether it be in any way more de- 
serving of regard than is the vilest legendary trash of 
the most besotted times of monkery? — From this rhodo- 
montadcj mixed up as it is with the sacred language of 
scripture, every sound mind turns with utter disgust. It 
is hard to imagine what that condition of the conscience 
could be, which might allow a man such as Jerome, to 
sit down, and deliberately string together these misera- 
ble inanities* That a stupid monk, who never had had a 
nobler thought, should do so, is w^hat one may under- 
stand; but in the case of a man of vigorous intellect, 
one is driven to the alternative, either of supposing some- 
thing like a possession, or infatuation, or otherwise must 
believe that he, and some other of his contemporaries,- 
the makers and venders of the like commodities, having 
forbidden the perusal of the gentile classic literature to 
the laity, laboured to supply the place of it with what 
should be higlily entertaining, and at the same time of a 
sort to stimulate the fanaticism, and to debilitate the rea- 
son of the people. This, however, would not be very 
unlike the "speaking lies in hypocrisy." 

The gentile classic literatTire! May Plato and Xeno- 
phon ^nd Cicero be mentioned in such a connexion? It 
is not without an emotion profoundly painful, that one 
turns from the turbid, frothy, and infectious stream of 
Jerome's ascetic writings, to the pellucid waters of pa- 
gan Greece and Rome. — Reason darkened indeed; but 

* Vita Pauli Erem. 
40 



466 THE OPPOSITION MADE TO ASCETICISM. 

it is reason still, and, moreover, reason, struggling to- 
ward the light; and exempt from virulence, from hypo- 
crisy, and from absurdity. Such a contrast impresses 
the mind powerfully with a sense of the infinite mis- 
chief that has been done to mankind by men, who, when 
Christianity, with its simple grandeur, and its divine 
purity, was fairly lodged in their hands, and committed 
to their care, could do nothing but madly heap upon it,, 
and often for selfish purposes, every grossness and every 
folly which might turn aside its influence, and expose it 
to contempt. 

It may be a Christian-like and kindly office to palliate 
the errors, and to cloak the follies, and to give a reason^ 
for the false notions of the Nicene divines; but when, on 
the other side, one thinks of the long centuries of wo,, 
ignorance, persecution, and religious debauchery, which 
took their character directly from the perversity of these 
doctors, it is hard to repress emotions of the liveliest in- 
dignation. As to Jerome, who coined afresh, and issued 
anew, all the superstitions of his age, and who sent 
them forward for fourteen hundred years, one can hard- 
ly think of him otherwise than as an enemy of his kind. 
By a line of causation, not very indirect, he has been 
the author of a hundred times more human misery (not 
to look into the hidden world) than was inflicted upon 
the nations by a Tamerlane.* 

* In what manner Ambrose and Augustine treated the opposers 
of the ascetic system may be seen by referring to the follow- 
ing places : — Ambrose, addressing pope Syricius (Epist. 42, class, 
i.) ^' his Lord and well-beloved brother," includes Jovinian in 
a list of condemned heretics — Manichees and others, to whom no 
indulgence could be shown. These, whom the most benign em- 
peror had execrated, and who were indeed deserving, as he says, 
" of all execration," had been condemned, first at Rome and then 
at Milan, whence they had been driven— quasi profugus. Jovi- 



MONKERY AND MIRACLE. 467 



MONKERY AND MIRxiCLE. 

As every one now knows that, in order to acquire a 
genuine acquaintance with history, we must examine the 
extant original materials of the times in question; so 
«very one knows, that these contemporary materials are 
to be examined in the full light of our modern good 
sense, and general intelligence. To lose ourselves in 
the original documents, and to be charmed out of our 
wits by iheir antique fascinations, is to read Homer like 

nian's opinion that there was no difference of merit between the 
married and the unmarried, is termed '^ a savage howling of fe- 
rocious wolves, scaring the flock," It is curious to find the great 
church authorities contending, with the most acrid zeal, for the 
two doctrines of the merit of virginity, and the efficacy of fast- 
ing, as if inseparable principles. Thus, Ambrose, Epist. 53, cer- 
tain babblers had come in, qui dicant nullum esse abstinentise 
meritum, nullum frugalitatis, nullam virginitatis gratiam . . . 
Jovinian, it appears, had belonged to a monastery at Milan, 
where he had neither seen any luxury, nor been allowed any li- 
berty of discussion. Augustine, in his Retractations, mentions 
the motives and occasions of his various works; speaking of the 
book de bono conjugali, he says, that the heresy of Jovinian had 
prevailed at Rome to such an extent, that several nuns, of whose 
purity there had been no previous suspicion, had been induced 
by it to fall into matrimony. But — huic monstro sancta ecclesia 
quae ibi est, fidelissime et fortissime resistit. Nevertheless the 
poison, not having been altogether expelled, Augustine had 
thought himself called upon to apply a remedy. This remedy 
(with the bishop's mode of treating his adversary) is to be found 
in his several treatises — de continentia — de bono conjugali — de 
virginitate — de conjugiis adulterinis — de nuptiis — de bono vidui- 
tatis — de opere monachorum — and, contra Julianum. In the 
book, de Haeresibus, Jovinian finds his place, and his alleged er- 
rors are particularly mentioned, c. 82, Cito taraen ista heeresis 
oppressa et extincta est, nee usque ad deceptionem aliquorum sa- 
cerdotum potuit pervenire. 



468 MONKERY AND MIRACLE. 

a school-boy, who, for the moment at least, believes, not 
merely in Homer's heroes, but in his gods and god- 
desses. The lecturer upon liistory finds himself com- 
pelled, in giving his account of the ten years' war, to 
strip off from the Iliad a prodigious quantityof finery, and 
to make sad work, with poetry and crests, before Achil- 
les, and Ajax, and Agamemnon, are reduced to their 
true dimensions, as blustering leaders of so many bands 
of brigands and pirates.* 

Now shall we allow a similar operation to be per- 
formed upon the Iliad of Nicene asceticism, or do we 
choose rather to keep a fool's paradise entire on this sa- 
cred ground. There is no need to go to Gibbon's school 
in this instance; in truth, the best security against the 
danger of finding ourselves there, in the end, is to be 
had in the prompt exercise of a sound and vigorous 
good sense. Renounce this good sense, and then we 
must either settle down in the flowery fields of Butler's 
Lives of the Saints — the fairy land of unbounded cre- 
dulity; or else yield cursives to a universal skepticism: 
and in fact, we are very likely to follow a path through 
the former, into the latter; that is to say, if we take our 
first lessons from Butler, to take our last from Gibbon. 

Grant it, that the task of paring romance down to his- 
tory, is an ungracious one. Nay, more; If it be reli- 
gious romance that is in question, it will be hard en- 
tirely to avoid an ill consequence, thence accruing, in- 
cidentally, to our own religious sentiments. The mere 
circumstance of sitting, for some time, so near to the 
" seat of the scorner," is dangerous; but whose is the 
fault? not ours surely, who must remove an oflfence that 
has been placed on the path by others. It is the legend- 
mongers who have done the mischief. If good and 

* Thucydides, lib. i. c. 5. 



MONKERY AND MIRACLE. 469 

learned men, like Alban Buller, will employ themselves 
in cramming twelve closely printed volumes v/ith pious 
fables, outraging reason, history, and religion, and will 
then moor this mole of mud to our common Christianity, 
to the great peril of the credulous, and to the still greater 
peril of the incredulous, what is to be done? Some will 
say — let it alone — leave it to sink by its own weight; and 
truly nothing better could have been done, if it had not 
happened that this very mass of feculence is just now 
being attached anew to our protestant church. 

** The Lives of the Saintsl" who, now-a-days, thinks 
or cares about the Lives of the Saints? or who would 
waste an hour in the serious endeavour to expose to 
contempt such a farrago? Unhappily we are not yet 
free to treat with contemptuous silence what so well de- 
serves it: and why we are not free is easily shown, as 
follows:— Let any one open Alban Butler's volumes, at 
hazard, and without looking to the dates of the several 
lives therein related, let him select a hw which appear 
the most ridiculously absurd, or which are, on any ac- 
count peculiarly offensive, and I will venture to predict 
that these articles, so distinguished by their extravagance 
and folly, will turn out to be Nicene, and not popish. In 
fact, they will be found to be translations, nearly literal, 
from Athanasius, Basil, Palladius, Jerome, or some of 
their contemporaries. On the contrary, any lives that 
may appear to be less objectionable, and, in a sense, 
edifying, will be those of modern Romanist saints. If 
then the Lives of the Saints, as a whole, be worthy of 
contempt, the principal stress of this contempt falls, not 
upon the church of Rome, but upon the church catholic 
of the third and fourth centuries. I make this averment 
without fear of contradiction; and 1 recommend the fact 
to the reader's consideration. 

40* 



470 MONKERY AND MIRACLE. 

But let US come to particular instances, for the more 
we do so, the more must our present argument gather 
strength. Among the enormous and revolting fables of 
this vast collection — Butler's Lives of the Saints, I will 
suppose the reader to fix upon two, namely the life of 
Paul the hermit (above referred to) and that of St. Hila- 
rion. But whence has the learned editor drawn these 
precious morsels? Is it from the stupid pages of some 
dreaming contemporary of St. Dunstan? No, it is from 
the vigorous and erudite tomes of Jerome — the most 
•gifted of the Nicene divines! The uninitiated reader, 
however, is very likely to imagine that the popish editor 
has garnished his materials, and has added to them what 
might recommend them the more to the bad taste of his 
credulous and superstitious catholic readers. The very 
reverse of this is the fact. Let him see if it be not so: 
if Butler's version of Jerome's lives be examined, it will 
appear that, instead of rendering them more superstitious, 
and more miraculous, and more popish, he has made 
them much less so: he omits what is the most offensive, 
he softens extravagant phrases, he inserts extenuations, 
or plausible explanations of manifest incongruities, and 
altogether offers, to the modern reader, in the place of 
what in the original is utterly shocking, or in the last 
degree puerile, what may be read. L^ a word, the popish 
editor chastises the Nicene legend-monger; and in col- 
lating the two — the original and the version, a convincing 
proof is obtained of the fact that, much more reason, and 
more piety too, has belonged to the Romish, than ever 
belonged to the Nicene church. It is not to be doubted 
that there are devout Romanists who, while they mio-ht 
bring themselves to approve of Butler, would loathe 
Jerome (if not told that this Jerome was Saint Jerome.) 
That any protestant should, after examination, profess 



MONKERY AND MIRACLE, 471 

to prefer Jerome, or Socrates, or Palladiiis, to Butler, I 
can hardly tliink possible, and will not believe. 

But there is a point of justice involved in this compa- 
rison between the Romanist and the Nicene biographers, 
which it would be wrong to omit to mention. The ex- 
cellent Alban Butler, an undoubting son of the church, 
set himself, at the distance of twelve centuries from the 
times in question, to collect edifying memoirs of the an- 
cient ascetics; and having^^rs^ taken the wise precaution 
of closing the window shutters of his library, within an 
inch of pitchy darkness, and having laid it down as a law, 
that he is never to enter upon any inquiry which, by pos- 
sibility, might lead him whither his church forbids him 
to go, he, by these means, saves himself (at least in par- 
ticular instances) from the flagrant guilt of putting forth 
as true, what he personally knew to be false. But how 
was it with the original compiler of these same stories? 
Jerome writes the lives of his contemporaries! Jerome 
was no simple soul, believing every thing from sheer 
guilelessness: he had trod the stage of the great world, 
and knew mankind; he had formed his taste by the study 
of Xenophon and Thucydides; he was thoroughly skilled 
in historical criticism; he was gifted with sagacity and 
judgment; and, as a literary forester, he had that sharp 
scent which enabled him to track a dead lion, if any such 
thing were actually in the wind: his temper moreover 
was of that corrosive quality which tends to the testing 
and the solving of adulterated articles. Now this Jerome 
compiles, at some length, the history of a certain w^on- 
der-working monk, his contemporary, who, in search, 
as he declared, of seclusion and oblivion, had traversed 
the principal countries of the Roman world — Egypt, 
Sicily, Italy, Greece, Syria; and wherever he went, he 
Jiad wrought the most astounding miracles, emulating 



472 MONKERY AND MIRACLE* 

those of Elijah, and of our Lord. If then these miracles 
were real, thousands of persons of all conditions, Chris- 
tians and pagans, were able to attest them, in quality of 
eye witnesses; and hundreds might readily have been ap- 
pealed to, if it had been thought desirable to institute 
any serious inquiry on the subject. 

Was then Jerome himself a believer in these miracles? 
or did he ever ask himself, while dressing them up for 
the entertainment of the church, whether they were true 
or false? If he did believe them, so as to preclude the 
necessity of any investigation, how gross must have 
been the delusion to which he had surrendered his pow- 
erful and acute mind! But did he not choose to ask 
himself whether he believed them or not; and seeing that 
they tended to glorify the church, and to recommend 
monkery, and orthodoxy, did he give them all the ad- 
vantage of his great reputation, mean while half, or more 
than half, suspecting them to be impious fabrications? 
I will attempt no solution of these difficulties, but will 
only say that, should I be hardly dealt with on account 
of my dealing with this Nicene doctor, I must hold up 
his lives of Paul and of Hilarion as my defence. To 
those who will profess to attach their faith to these pro- 
digious legends, I have nothing to say; with those who 
think of them as they deserve, I am safe. 

Affirmations of miraculous interposition, may, if un- 
true, float any where between delusion and fraud; and 
therefore they may involve various degrees of culpabi- 
lity, on the part of those who promulgate them. But no 
such narrative can float between ^?'i^//i nnd falsehood; for 
it must always be either true, or false, that the divine 
power has, in any alleged instance, diverted the ordi- 
nary course of nature. Now the Nicene ascetic system 
was either attested by a copious display of miraculous 



MONKERY AND MIRACLE. 473 

powers (as affirmed by the principal contemporary 
writers) or it was not so accredited. If it were, then 
what is protestantism, and what is the English church, 
which does not embrace, nay, which has put silent con- 
tempt upon a divinely sanctioned, and most ancient and 
catholic institution? But if the contrary be true, then 
what was that system itself, and what the moral condi- 
tion of the xihurch which embraced and admired it, while 
it made the boldest pretensions — false and blasphemous 
pretensions, to the power of working miracles — miracles 
in which no room was left for illusion, and easy credu- 
lity? The reader will choose his alternative. 

The question being then — What was the moral value 
of the ancient ascetic system, our first reply is — That 
it was what it might be consistently with its pretensions 
to miraculous powers: and it should be remembered that, 
in the fourth century, if we put out of view the custo- 
mary dreams, visions, and various forms of mere illu- 
sion, it was none but the monks and hermits, who 
claimed to work miracles; this credit therefore, or this 
stain — this glory, or this infamy, is the prerogative of 
the ascetic institute.* 

A SECOND reply to the question in hand, I have in part 
anticipated, and shall not pursue the topic farther; 
merely stating the fact that the ascetic institute was, in 
a moral sense, such as it was likely to be, seeing that it 
had been adopted, with no material modification, from 
the ancient gymnosophists, and the Buddhist sages. 

* Of several of the ancient hermits, there is reason to think bet- 
ter than that they should themselves have pretended to the pow- 
ers attributed to them. The lie was that of their biographers. 
Thus the nonsense and knavery attributed by Palladius to Ma- 
carius, the Egyptian, are utterly contradicted by the spirit of his 
writings. It was the besotted companions and disciples of some 



474 MONKERY, THE RELIGION 



MONKERY, THE RELIGION OF SOUTHERN 

EUROPE. 

A THIRD reply to the inquiry concerning the moral con- 
dition and influence of the ascetic institute, turns upon a 
consideration of what has always been (at least during 
the last eighteen hundred years) the physical and moral 
characteristics of the nations bordering upon the Medi- 
terranean. Unless we are resolved to shut our eyes to plain 
matters of fact, facts of this class must be taken into ac- 
count, whenever we look into the materials of the religious 
history of these nations. Not to do so is to take up sheer 
romance, for solid history; and moreover, as one error im- 
plies more, we shall really be doing the ancient church 
a great injustice, at the moment w^hen we are wishing 
to enhance its credit; for the same reasonable considera- 
tions which forbid our being duped by its romantic pro- 
fessions, supply also an apology for its follies, and a pal- 
liation for its grievous faults. 

During the last two thousand years, what has been the 
state of manners and morals in all the countries between 
the thirty-fifth and the forty-fifth parallels of latitude, and 
between the Caspian and the Atlantic? These zephyr- 
breathing and garden lands of the world have presented, 
throughout this course of time (or only with partial and 
transient exceptions) a social condition intimately dis- 
ordered by the want of moral tone; and parallel with this 
ill habit of the social mass, there has run on a religion 
which, while it has very faintly afi'ected the many, or to 
any good purpose, has spent its force upon a few, and 

of these good men who patched up the legend of their " virtues," 
as soon as they were gone. 



OF SOUTHERN EUROPE. 475 

these few so removed by artificial distinctions from their 
fellows, as to do little or no good, by their example. 
Throughout these countries, and during this lapse of ages, 
there have been the extremes in morals, but no mean. 

The philosophy of the moral, political, and religious 
history of southern Europe, turns upon this very fact. 
Northward of the forty-fifth parallel (in Europe) may be 
found — a generally diffused animal health, and a physi- 
cal robustness — and a wide middle class in society — and 
a breadth of opinion and feeling — and a soberness and 
mild liberality of judgment, and a dislike, and an avoid- 
ance of, enormities of conduct, and sentiment; none of 
which important elements of national well-being can be 
predicted of the south. 

Before the absolute moral merit of the nations, re- 
spectively, who occupy these two geographical bandsy 
can be ascertained, many intricate questions must be 
gone into ; but mean time, the characteristics^ above 
stated, remain undisturbed. And then, if, on this ground, 
the nineteenth century is to be compared with the third 
or fourth, it will appear that the difference which marks 
the lapse of time, attaches almost entirely to the north of 
Europe, where every thing, in that interval of time, has 
been regenerated, or absolutely created: while the south, 
amid many apparent revolutions, has remained substan- 
tially the same — physically, morally, and religiously. 
Indeed, whenever the ancient and the modern worlds 
are compared (and by ancient^ I now intend the declining^ 
period of the Roman empire) the difference discoverable 
is such as results, chiefly from that creation of a broad 
mean, in the social, political, and religious spheres, 
which has come about in northern Europe, during the 
last five centuries. 

The tendency of (pure) Christianity is always to create 



476 MONKERY, THE RELIGION 

a mean in society, or as we may say, to consolidate and 
extend the political, social, and moral terra firma, or 
wide continent of common interests, and ordinary or 
standard sentiments. Wherever the gospel is to get a 
footing in a country, the proclamation is of this sort, — 
" Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths 
straight; every valley shall be filled, and every mountain 
and hill shall be brought low, and the crooked shall be 
made straight, and the rough ways shall be made smooth." 
Not indeed that Christianity is a levelling doctrine, in 
the cant, modern sense of the term; but yet its gradual 
operation is to call into existence a mean, wherein, and 
whereupon, the extremes of high and low may meet, 
and be reconciled. Let a pure Christianity now take its 
course in Turkey, and what would be the political and 
social consequence, after a few years, but to blend the 
discordant elements of the national system; and first to 
create, and then to empower, a middle class, and a mid- 
dle doctrine, and a middle influence, which should at 
once elevate the degraded, and chastise and control the 
proud? In this happy sense Christ's doctrine is indeed 
revolutionary. 

Christianity was, in fact, just about to work this its pro- 
per effect upon the Roman world, and was making a hap- 
py commencement by putting woman into her long lost 
place, and by giving her personal virtue, and reverence 
and influence, without which, as there is no healthy condi- 
tion of the domestic system, so there can be no national 
virtue, or liberty, or elevation of character. This happy 
change was commencing, when the ascetic fanaticism 
came in; first, to poison the domestic system, at the 
core, by its hypocritical prudery, and its consequent se- 
paration of the sexes; and secondly, to turn ofl?* the fer- 
tilizing current of the most powerful and elevated senti- 



OF SOUTHERN EUROPE. 477 

ments from the field of common life, and to throw them 
all into the waste-pipe which emptied itself upon the 
wilderness. We use no tigure, or a figure only in the 
terms, when we say that the mighty waters of Christian 
moral influence, which would have renovated the Roman 
world, and have saved the barbarism of a thousand years, 
was, by the ascetic institute, shed over the horrid sands 
of Egypt and Arabia — there to be lost for ever! 

It was as if, on a rich and virgin soil, favoured by the 
sun, one were to find the plough, and the spade, and the 
various implements of husbandry, employed, by a stupid 
race, not upon the teeming lands, but in vainly enscalp- 
ing the surface of rocks, and in bootlessly furrowing the 
faithless sands of the shore! Such, in a word, was that 
perversion of the moral force of the gospel which was 
imbodied in the ancient asceticism. Southern Europe 
was therefore left to be southern Europe still, for ano- 
ther cycle of centuries, and monkish fanaticism, with its 
celibacy and its fastings, has continued now these fifteen 
hundred years, to be the grim antithesis of a wide-spread 
dissoluteness of manners. In Portugal, Spain, the south 
of France, Italy, Sicily, and the islands about, during all 
this lapse of time, while very few temperate and virtu- 
ous husbands and wives have blessed the common walks 
of life, monks and nuns, of ambiguous character, have 
swarmed from religious houses. Little or no national 
morality has been seen there; but more than enough of 
the madman's imitation of virtue and piety. Through- 
out these countries, and during these ages, few families 
have been blessed with purity and peace; but miracles 
have been a going on all hands; the green leaf and sweet 
fruits of piety have not covered the fields; but the secu- 
lars and regulars, like a perpetual visitation of locusts^ 
have brooded on the waste. 

41 



478 MONKERY, THE RELIGION 

In passing, fresh aud full-fraught with English feel- 
ings, from our northern latitudes to the south or Europe, 
every one feels strongly that the degrading superstition 
of the common people is not a doctrine and practice that 
have invaded these countries, oppressing and corrupting 
the social system, but rather, that it is the spontaneous 
and congenial religion of races distinguished by physical 
debility, by relaxation of principle, by abjectness of soul, 
by ferocity, and by actual debauchery. The gospel, 
even now, would indeed bring in upon these very peo- 
ple, the energy of moral health, and it would have done 
so in the times of Diocletian; but those who were then 
intrusted with it, mistook its spirit, and in holding forth 
a crazed asceticism as the only genuine virtue, they left 
the mass of the people just such as they found it — de- 
bauched, ferocious, superstitious; and such, with tran- 
sient exceptions, have they continued, under the influ- 
ence of the very same system, from that time to this. 

Beside many differences, affecting the mere surface 
of society, and which belong to our general civilization, 
as distinguishing modern from ancient southern Europe, 
there is one moral and ecclesiastical point of contrast^ 
which I would not overlook; and it is this — The church, 
in the fourth century, was moving down a declivity: 
whereas at present, and long since, it has reached its 
point of lowest depression, upon a dead level. Now, so 
long as this decline was in progress, all persons of fer- 
vent mind, conscious of the general movement, struggled 
mightily to arrest it. This eager and anxious struggle 
is then that which gives vehemence and animation to the 
hortatory compositions of the Nicene age. The great 
preachers and writers, whom we have occasion so fre- 
quently to name, stood midway, and breast-high in the 
torrent; and how passionately do they contend for their 
footing, and how manfully do they fight the billows! 



OF SOUTHERN EUROPE. 479 

There was^ therefore, a resistance, an agony, an ani- 
mation belonging to the church in the fourth century, 
which do not belong to it (in the same countries) at pre- 
sent. Yet it would be going much too far to affirm that 
the moral condition of the mass of society was better 
then than it is now, on the same soils. There is an abun- 
dance of evidence proving the extreme corruption of 
manners in the era now in question; nor can it be re- 
quisite, in this place, to enlarge upon so trite a subject. 
It is, therefore, a sheer illusion — although it be one easily 
followed, which would assume our northern and English 
notions of morality — the morality of our sober middle 
classes, and then, attributing any such state of things to 
the social system in the fourth century, and to the na- 
tions bordering the Mediterranean, imagine that the as- 
cetic virtues of those times stood high above any such 
level of morals. In taking cur idea of the Nicene mo- 
nastic life from the romantic descriptions given of it by 
its credulous admirers, we think of it as an obelisk, 
pointing to the skies, the base of which rested on firm 
level ground, and on a ground of general virtue and 
piety. It was in fact no such thing: — the Nicene asce- 
ticism rose out of a bog, and it barely kept its apex above 
the wide-spread corruption: or it was like those monu- 
ments of Egyptian magnificence which just peep out of 
the deluge of sand that has long smothered the glory of 
so many temples and palaces. 

The ancient ascetic virtue, far from being lofty abso- 
lutely ^ was barely so relatively; and indeed, if we are 
to trust some of its best informed advocates, it had ac- 
tually worked itself down a good way below the general 
level of decency, temperance, and continence. It was 
therefore very far from being, what we are likely to 
imagine it to have been, when we read carefully selected 
specimens of ascetic piety. 



480 MORAL QUALITY OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, 



MORAL QUALITY OF THE ASCETIC INSTI- 
TUTE, AS IT AFFECTED THE MONKS 
THEMSELVES. 

The evidence of history forgotten, and our better 
Christian notions laid aside, it is then easy for an ardent 
and serious mind to follow the hermit into his wilder- 
ness, or the monk into his cloister, with a vivid sympa- 
thy. In fact, the real difficulty with persons of imagi- 
native temperament, is to repress that yearning of the 
soul for seclusion and meditation, which impels them to 
enter upon the same flowery path. There are those, and 
it is more than a very few, to whom the course of self- 
denial is — the continuing to live in th^ midst of the tur- 
moil, the duties, and the enjoyments of common life; 
and to whom the course of self-indulgence would be that 
of dreaming existence away in a cloister, or on the sunny 
side of a mountain, far remote from the haunts of man. 
He is the Epicurean, who surrenders himself to the 
leading of his personal tastes, without regard to duty, or 
to the welfare of others: nows these tastes may be of a 
sensual kind, or they may be imaginative, or they may 
be intellectual, or they may be a mixture of all, and we 
may call them religious; but surely a wonderful mistake 
rests with those who, while they are giving an unbridled 
swing to their particular inclinations as contemplatists or 
intellectualists, and are leaving the world to go its own 
way; yet speak disdainfully of the gluttons or of the vo- 
luptuous, as Epicureans, and speak boastfully of them- 
selves as self-denying men! A poor proof of self-denial, 
surely, to wear a filthy hair shirt, and to wait until after 
sunset for one's breakfast, if, in doing so, a man tho- 
roughly pleases himself and no one else! No voluptu^ 



AS It AFFECTED tHE MONKS THEMSELVES. 481 

ary is so uniform or so thorough-going in self-pleasing, 
as the hermit, who, while he permits some charitable 
dupe to bring him his weekly rations of bread, makes it 
his glory never to see, to speak to, or to thank his bene- 
factor. 

The capital illusions of the anchoret being duly al- 
lowed for, then it is easy to believe that he may have 
had his virtues, of a certain sort, and his devotion, too, 
and his high-wrought unearthliness: but, then, no de- 
scriptions which we may meet with of the loftiness or 
of the deliciousness of the anchoretic or monastic life, 
ought for a moment to make us forget its inherent sel- 
fishness, and its direct contrariety to the spirit and pre- 
cepts of the gospel. The institute can never be proved 
to be abstractedly good, by any amount of this sort of 
incidental recommendation; and it is clear that what- 
ever recommendations, of this sort, we may allow to 
have attached to the early ascetic life, attach much more 
decisively, and with fewer drawbacks, to the institute as 
we find it regulated in later times, and when it came 
under the eye of the Romish church. 

To any then who would indignantly ask — "What! do 
you make no account of the pure and holy lives of mul- 
titudes of the ancient solitaries?" We may reply — Yes, 
we make much of them, even after we have righted the 
balance by considering how much selfishness, and how 
much delusion, entered into the whole system. But then 
we ought to make still more account of what is really 
more pure and holy, and is far less open to suspicion, 
and is better relieved by instances of learning and uti- 
lity, I mean the monkery of modern times. As to any 
practical inference, drawn from the assumed sanctity 
of the ancient solitaries, in favour of the system, a for- 

41* 



482 MORAL QUALITY OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, 

tiori may such an inference be made good in favour of 
the Romish monastic orders. If, then, this hair-cloth 
Epicureanism is to be restored among us, it would be 
idle to think that we could do better than follow the mo- 
del of the Benedictines, or the Franciscans.* 

It is, however, necessary to descend a little farther 
toward particulars. With this view I will now offer 
some considerations, and adduce some evidence, tending 
to exhibit the moral quality of the ascetic institute ac- 
cording to its Theory, and assuming it to have been 
what its authors intended, and as good in fact as some of 
its admirers represent it to have been. We must after- 
wards inquire what its moral influence was under its 
actual condition; and under each of these heads we must 
advert, on the one hand to the case of those who came 
within the enchanted circle, and on the other, to that of 
those who stood loithout it. 

I here substitute the phrase — the ascetic institute — it 
being remembered that celibacy was the prime article of 
that institute; the more comprehensive term being em- 
ployed, because it is not practicable so to analyze the 
moral result of the entire system, as to be able to assign 
its precise amount of influence, in the general product, 
to the celibacy as distinguished from the abstinences, the 
mortifications, the seclusions, and the other observances 
of the monastic life. 

The greatest possible advantage is given to the Nicene 
asceticism by deriving our notions of its Theory! from 

* " By all which 1 have ever read of the old, and have seen of 
the modern monks, I take the preference to be clearly due to the 
last, as having a more regular discipline, more good learning, 
and less superstition among them than the first." — Middleton. 

f By Theory I mean the system entire — contemplative , and 
practical, as imbodied in the Monastic Constitutions, and in Ba^ 
^il's ascetic treatises and epistles. 



AS IT AFFECTED THE MONKS THEMSELVES. 483 

the writings of Basil, inasmuch as this eminent man 
leaves out of his system many of those offensive enormi- 
ties which attached to it as practised in Egypt and Syria; 
and at the same time he includes many excellencies and 
embellishments which others did not allow. 

Take this scheme of life, then, at the best, and sup- 
posing it exempt from all suspicion, it is, in its very 
idea, a moral suicide. The suicide violates the often 
quoted rule — non est injussu imperatoris, &c., by the 
sword or the rope; the ascetic does so as effectually by 
his vow. Under colour of piety, the monastic system 
is a course of contumacy towards the government of 
God; or a wilful and captious rejection of the part as- 
signed to a man, and the taking up, without leave, ano- 
ther part, in compliance with a fastidious, infirm, self- 
indulgent, or morose temper. It was a behaviour like 
that of a humoured and fractious child, who will be very 
good just so long as you allow him to please himself, 
and to sit sullen in a corner, but who breaks out into 
passion the moment you attempt to control him. As the 
ascetic had set out with a total misapprehension of the 
spirit of Christianity and of the scheme of salvation, so 
did he fall into the most extreme error in regard to the 
very nature of virtue, which is not a celestial phantasy, 
that may be realized if a man is allowed to shape every 
thing about him to his mind, but a terrestrial excellence, 
consisting in the adherence to fixed principles, under ex- 
ternal circumstances of whatever kind, and even the 
most disadvantageous. This is the very turning point 
in the discrimination between real virtue and every sort 
of counterfeit, that it is — the acting uniformly, or with 
an invariable purpose, under and amidst all diversities, 
and those the most perplexing, of external circumstances; 
or, as we technically say, ** temptations," '* I will be 



484 MORAL QUALITY OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, 

virtuous," says the ascetic, " if only you will let me 
chalk out my own path." While those who alone really 
deserve to be called virtuous are confronting every spe- 
cies of difficulty, opposition, and seduction, upon the 
rugged common of the open world, the nice ascetic turns 
oif upon a level gravel-walk, between two walls, and 
there, forsooth, he too will be virtuous! 

An inquiry, therefore, concerning the moral quality of 
the ascetic scheme, according to its theory, might fairly 
be cut short by the previous exception — There can be 
no virtue of a genuine sort in a system of conduct which 
allows a man to evade whatever duties he happens to 
mislike. Among the many illusions which meet us on 
all sides in the Nicene church none, therefore, was more 
gross than that involved in the customary language of 
the admirers of the ascetic life, who spoke of it always 
as the highest style of virtue. Just as well point to a 
marble statue, whether it be of a Socrates, or of a Sile- 
nus, of a Diana, or of a Bacchus, would make no differ- 
ence, and say, *' See what temperance is here imbodied, 
what command of the passions, what unruffled fortitude, 
what angelic purity, what indifference to the pleasures 
and honours of the world!" Not so, for these excel- 
lencies are the qualities of a conscious voluntary agent, 
and can never be predicated of a block of marble. And 
so, it is not the ascetic, in his cell or cloister, who may 
justly be called temperate, pure, self-denying, heavenly- 
minded; but rather the man who, surrounded by the or- 
dinary inducements to act and feel otherwise, neverthe- 
less holds control over " the lusts and desires," as well 
of *' the flesh as of the mind." 

And what if, after thus incurring the guilt of moral 
suicide, and after running aw^ay, as he thinks, from all 
temptations, the monk is found, by his own confession, 



AS IT AFFECTED THE MONKS THE:\ISELVE3. 485 

to have become the abject and conscience-smitten slave 
of heart-burning impurities.* A Christian man, living in 
the midst of every social relation, and calmly going in 
and out among the occasions of common life, yet prac- 
tically remembers that, " his body is the temple of the 
Holy Ghost." The ascetic, following implicitly the 
holy Basil's instructions, vows chastity; — and in fact 
violates it every hour of his existence: he subscribes to 
Basil's rule never to speak to, to touch, or look upon a 
woman (unless by the most absolute necessity.!) But 
shall we listen — no we would not listen to the ascetic's 
own pitiable description of his conflicts with "/Ae adver- 
sary,''^ If there be any thing at all belonging to the 
moral nosology of human nature, which is at once hor- 
rible and loathsome, it is that idea of the ascetic agonies 
which we cannot but gather from incidental confessions 
abounding in the ascetic writings. Is then the monk's 
actual condition — physical and moral, a desirable one? 
and is his the choicest style of virtue — is he the chaste 
and virtuous man compared with the Christian husband 
and father? 

It is easier to allow there to have been a certain order 
oi piety, than any kind o^ morality, among the ascetics. 
Let it be granted that, to condemn the debilitated stomach 
to churn saliva from sun-rise to sun-set, might possibly 
promote devotion, but assuredly, there is nothing in 

* Ego. . . .saspe choris intereram puellarum: pallebant ora jeju- 
niis, et mens desideriis aestuabat. . . Jerom. ad Eustach. " Listen 
not," says Ephrem, " to the enemy who whispers thee, ov juvoltov 

aou/' p. 161. Oxford. Expressions of similar import abound in 
the ascetic writings. It is impossible to doubt what was the real 
mental condition of many of the ascetics, perhaps of most. 
t Const. Monas. c. 3. 



486 MORAL QUALITY OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, 

such a discipline which we can call morality. There is 
morality in "speaking evil of no man," but no morality 
in not speaking at all. There is morality in not eating 
more than is good; but none in not eating at all. There 
is morality in acting, speaking, and thinking, chastely, 
when the temptation to do otherwise is presented; but 
none in avoiding those temptations which, in fact, are 
the least to be feared, while those are foolishly incurred 
which are the most insidious, and the most likely to 
take effect. There may indeed have been pure and 
holy ascetics; but then their asceticism was no ingre- 
dient of their holiness or purity; nor even a means to- 
ward it; but on the contrary, and by their own confes- 
sion, it was always a greater impediment than the actual 
trials of common life could have offered. With the 
same grace, and the same inclination towards virtue, 
they would have made much more proficiency if relieved 
from the intolerable load of their " rule," than they did, 
as burdened by it. 

A man may, in the wantonness of his presumption, 
impose upon himself some task so difficult, and so idle, 
as that, while actually making the most prodigious ef- 
forts, the visible result is little or nothing; as if one 
were to resolve to walk always on the heel and the toe, 
without allowing the sole of the foot to touch the ground, 
and mean while, not to exhibit any awkwardness of gait, 
or to fall behind others: terrible would be the torment 
and toil of such an exploit; and a man, using his feet 
naturally, might walk twenty miles for one, with the 
same fiitigue. Now the ascetics, or athletae, as they 
were called, sweating and wasting themselves to skele- 
tons, on the tread-wheel of their devout task-work, what 
did they do but just effect a useless rotation! So diffi- 
cult as they confess, and so arduous, was the mere rou- 



/ 



AS IT AFFECTED THE MONKS THEMSELVES 487 

tine of the r-^ligious life, that a monk had no chance of 
acquitting himself tolerably well, unless he surrendered 
himself, body and soul, to the work. To get through 
with the daily and nightly task of prayers, psalm-singing, 
watchings, scourgings, fastings, and all this time to keep 
" the enemy ^'^ at bay, that is, to exclude the most abomi- 
nable imaginations, was the utmost that mortal powers 
might be equal to. Not a particle of moral force, there- 
fore, was left at large to be employed in the reasonable 
duties of a useful Christian course. The dLo-ny^^ig was a 
task for a Hercules, and it would have been cruel to 
have demanded from a wretch thus worn down by ex- 
cessive toils, any thing more than his rule prescribed. 

Those who, on Christian and reasonable principles, 
exercise themselves daily in "godliness and virtue," 
personal and relative, find that they have enough to do, 
without undertaking any such supererogatory labour as 
that of removing a heap of sand, in a sieve, from one 
side of the monastery garden to-day, only that they may 
have to return it, by the like means, to its former position 
to-morrow. 

From the general tenor of the ascetic memoirs it ap- 
pears clearly that almost the whole moral and spiritual 
/energies of the soul were spent and exhausted upon the 
artificial part of the system of discipline; and indeed it 
is but too evident, that, with more than a few, the de- 
fence of the citadel of monastic virtue, consumed the 
entire forces of the mind and body. Is such a system 
then a wise and eligible one, and likely to promote mo- 
rals and real virtue on broad ground? Even if we could 
believe that it did secure, for the monk, a higher place 
in heaven, the ascetic practice cost him nearly all his 
virtue on earth. By virtue we ought to mean a.pii:», in the 
Christian sense of the word, that is to say, a quality of 



488 MORAL QUALITY OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, 

actions, and of dispositions, and habits, marked by vi-' 
gour, animation, and prodnctiveness. What is, or can 
be, the virtue of the inert, or of the imbecile, or of the 
frivolous, or of the abject? at the best, it is only a lan- 
guid semblance of the shining reality, like the dimmedy 
flickering image of the sun, reflected from a puddle: and 
such, generally speaking, was the virtue of the monks. 

Let the reader, after perusing Basil's Monastic Con- 
stitutions, and those expounded, or drawn into detail m 
Cassian's Institutes, imagine what would be the effect 
which such a system must produce upon his own con- 
duct and sentiments. Consider the principal elements 
of this system: — beside the vow of celibacy, and the 
other rigorous rules and abstinences of the ascetic life, 
the monk was removed from the influence of every one 
of those motives which impart energy to the human 
mind; and he was at the same time brought under the 
influence of every motive which tends to break down its 
force, to dissipate its individual purposes, and to reduce 
it to a condition of hopeless degradation, and ineptitude. 

Not content with forbidding to marry, the ascetic Ly- 
curgus sternly demanded of the monk, that, as far as 
possible, he should break connexion with his nearest re- 
latives, and literally cease, henceforward, to know his 
parents, brethren, and sisters, according to the flesh! a 
measure this which, how severe soever, was found to be 
an indispensable condition of the conventual life, and 
necessary to the enforcement of obedience. Such was 
the first iron-hearted lesson of this schooling in celestial 
virtue! It is curious to contrast these atrocities of the 
system, with the actual fact, not merely that the monks, 
though estranged from their natural connexions, were 
used to buzz from house to house, meddling with what- 
ever they should have let alone, but that, wjienevcr the 



Jhai 



AS IT AFFECTED THE MONKS THEMSELVES. 489 



portunity presented itself, these holy persons, who 
ad devoted their lives to celestial contemplations, pushed 
themselves into courts, and palaces, and halls of justice, 
and into the tents of military commanders, taking it 
upon themselves to overrule secular ajfTairs, of every 
kind, with a high hand.* Thus it was that the men who 
had renounced marriage, actually lived in shameless 
concubinage; and that those who had disowned their pa- 
rents and nearest relatives, were the common mischief 
makers in families; and that those who had proclaimed 
themselves the citizens of the heavenly country, under- 
took the administration of the world's affairs, and would 
be foremost in the control of fleets and armies! 

It was the unalterable law of tlie monastic institute, 
that a monk should retain no personal property — scarcely 
his right in the filthy rug that covered his shoulders. 
The pecuniary consequences of this rule we have not 
now particularly to do with, but it is easy to see in what 
way it would operate to animate the zeal of the chiefs, 
the bishops and abbots, who were the fund-holders, in 

* " Voici une etrange contradiction de I'esprit humain. Les 
niinistres de la religion, chez les premiers RomainSj n'etant pas 
exclus des charges et de la societe civile, s' embarrass e rent peu 
de ses affaires. Lorsquela religion chretienne fut etablie, les ec- 
clesiastiques qui etaient plus separes des affaires dumonde, s'en 
melerent avec moderation: mais lorsque, dans la decadence de 
I'empire, les moins furent le seul clerge, ces gens, destines par 
une profession plus particuliere a fuir et a craindre les affaires, 
embrasserent toutes les occasions qui purent leur y donner part; 
ils ne cesserent de faire du bruit partout, et d'agiter ce monde 
qu'ils avaient quitte. 

"Aucune affaire d'etat, auc une paix^ aucune guerre, aucune 
treve, aucune negotiation, aucun mariage ne se traita que par le 
ministere des momes; les conseils du prince en furent remplis^ et 
les assemblees de la nation presque toutes composees." — Mortr 
tesquieuj Grand ^ des Rom, cap. 22. 

42 




490 MORAL QUALITY OF THE ASGETIG INSTITUTE, 

trumpeting- the delights and rewards of the monastic lifer. 
Vast wealth, by this very means, came under the con- 
trol of spiritual persons. But w^e now think only of the 
monk, individually. Manual labours were indeed a part 
of his dally discipline; but then this labour was the 
cheerless druggery of a slave; — a slave of the most ab- 
ject class; for never could he improve his condition, by 
his exertions: toil was toil without a motive. Often it 
was a task imposexi simply as a proof and trial of im- 
plicit obedience: he was enjoined to dig, and to fill in- 
to carry, and to re-carry, to build and to pull down. 
Could the energy of virtue survive these vilifying exer- 
cises? Is a man found, in fact, to retain his dignity, as 
the image of God, or does he reserve to himself that in- 
dividuality of purpose which is the very ground of his 
accountableness, when thus, or in any such way, he is 
trodden in the dust? The intelligible and stimulating 
motives which ordinarily prompt men to spontaneous 
exertions, afford also the fulcrum of all active virtue. 
Even those virtues of which there was so much talk in 
the Nicene church, as for example almsgiving, were ren- 
dered impracticable by the monastic rules. A monk 
who could never be master of an obolus, how could he 
practise that capital virtue, apart from which, according 
to the authorized doctrine of the church itself, even vir- 
ginity could not secure admission into heaven? 

The demands of morality are not to be acquitted 
in single acts; nor are habitual duties to be transacted 
wholesale. The monk, who, just as the reluctant miser 
makes his will, did all the charity of his lii'e, at one 
stroke, in resigning his estate to the church or monas- 
tery, did none at ail, in the eye of reason or Cljristian- 
ity; — Christian almsgiving is the imparling, daily, or as 
occasions arise, to the needv, something which is a 



AS IT AFFECTED THE MONKS THEMSELVES. 491 

man's own, and which he might retain to his proper 
use. 

Inasmuch as genuine morality is the doing right, when 
the doing wrong is possible, so, jnst in proportion as 
the personal independence and liberty of an agent is re- 
stricted, his sphere of moral excellence is narrowed. 
And here let it be noticed that, although you may im- 
pose many restraints upon a man's visible, bodily, or 
civil liberty, while yet yau leave him in possession of 
that liberty of the soul without which he ceases to be ac- 
countable, and apart from which he can practise no real 
virtue — in proportion as restraint touches the soul itself, 
and passes inward, from the visible behaviour, to the 
very centre of the moral nature, the man is deprived of 
that liberty w^hence virtue takes its commencement. 
Thus, an over-anxious and rigorous parent is sometimes 
seen to keep so stern an eye upon, not the conduct 
merely, but the inmost sentiments of a child — looking into 
his very soul, that the victim of this well-mean^ cruel- 
ty, while precluded perhaps from overt acts of disobe- 
dience, is also denied the very possibility of becoming 
in any genuine sense, good and virtuous. Now, in the 
monastic system, taking the theory of it from Basil, 
where it is to be found in its mildest and least offensive 
form, not only was every part of the monk's exterior 
conduct, even to the most trivial circumstances of per- 
sonal behaviour, prescribed, and coijipliance exacted un- 
der severe penalties; but an unreserved confession, to 
the superior or to his deputy, was enjoined; and not 
merely the confession of delinquencies in conduct^ whe- 
ther more or less important, but every faithlessness or 
failure of the spirit, and every wandering of the desires, 
w^as to be ingenuously and punctiliously exposed: and 
ibis discipline was to be carried up into the recesses of 



402 MORAL QUALITY OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, 

the soul, until the victim of it had surrendered the last 
wrecks of his moral nature, and had allowed the foot 
of his spiritual tyrant to trample upon the pitiful residue 
of those personal affections which make a man, a man. 
And this scheme of execrable despotism was glorified 
by all the heads and leaders of the Nicene church, as a 
school of *' divine philosophy," and as a high training 
of heavenly virtue! 

Virtue! — the last life blood of virtue, or of the energy 
whence virtue might have sprung, was bled out of the 
tortured monk, drop by drop, and then the needless seve- 
rity of binding him, hand and foot, and of bandaging his 
eyes, and of gagging him, was exacted, and after all, the 
wretch, reduced to this syncope of the moral .nature, 
was exhibited as a faultless pattern of holiness, the 
aya.x[xa. of all excellence, earthly and heavenly! 

Such was the Nicene monkery in its theory, and upon 
too many the theory took effect, in all its intensity of 
cruelty and horror, or in its sad efficacy to produce the 
apathy and vacuity of mind and heart of an idiot. But 
in fact, and, as appears, in the greater proportion of in- 
stances, every kind of irregularity, and the grossest li- 
centiousness came in to mitigate this theory, in its ope- 
ration, and so to relieve the cold horrors of the monas- 
tery by swamping it with corruptions. A wretched state 
of any system truly is that in which the only relief that 
can be lookedlbr from the pressure of tyranny, is what 
may slip in through the sewers and sluices of profligacy! 
So it was, precisely, in the Nicene monasteries and con- 
vents. To look at them in the constitutions of the Cap- 
padocian bishop, is to feel amazement, but to look into 
theni, through the remonstrant pages of Chrysostom, 
and Jerome, is only to be filled with contempt. 

As often as any stern and fanatical renovator came into 



AS IT AFFECTED THE MONKS THEMSELVES. 493 

th-e management of these religious houses, a return was 
made to the theory of the system, which, taking effect 
upon the sincere and simple-hearted, and reducing others 
to outward decorum, seemed to. work wonders. Such a 
reform, just lasting out the life-time of its mover, quick- 
ly gave place to the ordinary state of things; leaving the 
institute to what may well be called its natural condition 
of mingled fanatical and puerile absurdity, of idiot-like 
inertness, and of shameless profligacy. 

He must be a bold Quixote who should undertake to 
show that such has not been the ordinary condition of 
the monkish institute from age to age. Or if there are 
times in its history which might claim an exemption, 
certainly the period with which we have now to do was 
not such a time: — it was not, if we are to receive the re- 
port of the best qualified contemporary witnesses; and 
especially if we may interpret, on principles of common 
sense, the incidental allusions to the state of things 
around them, which these witnesses have let fall. 

And why should we not deal in this rational manner 
with the materials in our hands? On what grounds do 
they claim to be handled with a credulous reverence? 
The canonical writings do not ask for any such indul- 
gence, why then should the Nicene? But to peruse them 
in the unrestrained exercise of a vigorous good sense, is 
to convince oneself that llie Nicene monkery was alto- 
gether less deserving of respect than that of almost any- 
other age. It would indeed be easy to '' get up " a re^ 
presentation which should seem to contradict this aver^ 
ment. Single homilies and treatises may be picked out 
of the mass, which would charm the uninitiated. But 
let the same method be applied to a rather later period, 
and we must acknowledge it to be fallacious. Suppose, 

42* 



494 MORAL QtTALITY OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, 

for example, we take the De Imitatione Christi, and as- 
sume that the occupants of cloisters, generally, in the 
author's time were such as he himself was. — First let 
us look into the caustic writings of the author of the 
Laudatio Stultitias, who assuredly will prove a safer 
guide to the historical inquirer. 

There was indeed a Thomas a Kempis in the fifteenth 
century, and there were many kindred spirits, dispersed 
among the monastic orders at the same time. There was 
a Macarius in the fourth century; and a " seven thou- 
sand," unknown to the world, but reserved by sovereign 
grace in an age of wild fanaticism and wide-spread pro- 
fligacy — religious and irreligious. Religious profligacy! 
< — I mean the hardeped licentiousness of men and women 
who, while making the loftiest pretensions, were living 
in the practice of the foulest vices; or, to say the least 
and the best that can be said, were so living, just within 
the pale of ostensible virtue, as to show that their heart 
and mind were always wandering beyond it. There 
will be false members attached to the purest communi- 
ties; but the plain import of Chrysostom's representa- 
tions compels us to believe that, among the professors of 
asceticism, in his times, the pure were the excepted few, 
while the shameless practices against which he inveighs 
characterized the conduct of the many. *'I do not speak 
of all,"* says the indignant yet cautious preacher. What 
does this mean, but that he did speak of most, when he 
charged the monks and nuns with the most flagitious in- 
decencies? 

** To such a pass have things come now-a-days, that 
a Christian man or woman had better be married than 
profess virginity." Ah, how much better, could but the 

* Chrysost. torn. i. p. 306. 



AS IT AFFECTED THE MONKS THEMSELVES. 495 

Nicene church have understood so simple a truth! Not 
understanding it, thousands, and tens of thousands, of 
souls were driven on, till they had reached a condition 
more frightful than any other which an accountable being 
can occupy. The profligacy of the sensual and giddy 
herd of mankind has no such appalling aggravation at- 
taching to it as that which attends the course of those 
whose intemperance has the blackness of hypocrisy, 
whose excesses are a sacrilege, who go into the temple 
of God with the language of devotion, every syllable of 
which, coming from such lips, is a blasphemy; and who 
retire from the church to chambers of wantonness, clad 
in a garb which should scorch them. Multitudes, in an 
early season of religious fervour, were enticed into re- 
ligious houses, w^here every better purpose was speedily 
overthrown by the most dangerous seductions, and 
where, deprived of the invigorating influence of common 
motives, and strenuous employments, and breathing the 
sweltering -atmosphere of pseudo-spiritual excitements, 
they met with facilities they had not dreamed of, for 
gratifying the worst propensities. 

Enthusiasts err on no point more grievously, than in 
the. supposition that the many, among whom they may 
excite a momentary sympathetic extravagance, will con- 
tinue to be as absurd as themselves, when left to the 
gravitation of their proper natures. Unhappily, the 
broad net which the ascetic enthusiasts cast over the 
waters of the church, entangled multitudes who were 
susceptible of just so much of the crazy influence as to 
prevent their speedy return to the common world; but 
by no means of so much as might have enabled them to 
leave behind them its vices. — Mad enough to hold to 
their profession of celestial virtue, and yet sober enough 
to avail themselves coolly of every opportunity to belie it. 



496 MORAL QTTALITV OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, 

It is but the surface of a subject, such as the one now 
before us, that can, with any propriet}'-, be touched in a 
publication which may fall into the hands of the young. 
Those who have read certain of the ascetic writers will 
grant that a due regard to the feelings of the general 
reader forbids my making such a use of my materials as 
would be the most conclusive. I cannot suppose that an 
ingenuous opponent would take advantage of the pecu- 
liar difficulty which attaches to the subject; or that, pre- 
suming upon the impracticability of fully opening the 
wound of the monastic system, he would scout the mea- 
ger evidence which I have actually adduced. A cheap 
triumph of this sort would be a perilous one. I will 
dismiss the subject then with one remark — 

Although debauched manners will not consist with ge- 
nuine holiness of heart, they will very well consist with 
a higl%-wrought sentimental sanctimoniousness;— for 
there is no real contrariety between a gross voluptuous- 
ness, and a refined voluptuousness. Now this general 
fact being admitted, as it \vili by all who know what 
human nature is, I request the reader, in the first place, 
io turn to the statements already made, pp. 238 — 242, 
concerning the imaginative sensitiveness, and the prurient 
pudicity with which Basil laboured to affect ihe female 
mind. Let us distinctly conceive of the moral and in- 
tellectual condition of young women fully surrendering 
themselves to this kind of influence, which led them to 
people their dressing-rooms with invisible admirers. 
Then let us turn, either to Basil's own. intimations con- 
cerning the shameless profligacy that was often going on 
in the monastic houses; or, still better, lo Chrysostom's 
very explicit and astounding statements of the manners 
Qi the nuns in his time.* How stands the case then? 

^ See notes at tlie end. 



AS IT AFFECTED THE MONKS THEMSELVES. 497 

Basil had fomented a dangerous sentimentality which 
could have no other effect than that which we find ac- 
tually to have resulted from it, namely — the loss of the 
last remains of feminine delicacy, and a grossness of 
conduct which many of the unfortunates whom society 
has expelled, would blush to imitate — and in fact would 
not imitate, even in the last stages of their degradation. 

Yet such is the reach of inconsistency, when once re- 
ligion and morals are unhinged, that these same women 
— these virgins! could issue reeking from their quarters, 
and frequent church, and approach the *' tremendous 
altar," and, as we are assured, could, with unblushing 
face, and while all blushed for them, admit there and at 
the very moment when the " terrible mysteries " were 
celebrating, the coaxing attentions of their monkish pa- 
ramours! 

Whatever may be the licentiousness prevailing in mo- 
dern catholic countries, I believe that the decorum of 
public worship is rarely violated; and on the contrary, 
that an imposing solemnity, and deep abstraction, cha- 
racterize, generally, the behaviour of those who attend 
mass. The scenes which Chrysostom speaks of, as of 
ordinary occurrence, at Antioch, and at Constantinople, 
would not, I think, be tolerated now in any church in 
Europe, 



THE NECESSARY OPERATION OF AN ASCE- 
TIC INSTITUTE UPON THE MASS OF 
CHRISTIANS. 

Wherever a system exists which is favourable to 
such a course, persons of fervent and moody religious 



498 OPERATION OF AN ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

temper will, notwithstanding the remonstrances of com- 
mon sense, and Christian principles, and the reluctances 
of ordinary motives, betake themselves to the ascetic 
life, which, in truth, has many charms for the inert and 
feeble-minded. And such persons will say — " We have 
counted the cost; we know what we are doing; and we 
think ourselves free to obey what we feel to be a holy 
impulse." Let it be so; yet there is one part of this 
'*cost" which such persons seldom or never take any 
account of, namely, the cost to the community, which, 
as an inevitable consequence, attaches to the establish- 
ment in a country of the ascetic institute; I mean the 
cost to public morals. This serious consequence, al- 
though seldom adverted to, invariably attends the preva- 
lence of such a system. A few words will be enough 
for explaining this connexion of cause and effect. 

The motives of .Christianity are found to take effect 
in various degrees of intensity upon any number of indi- 
viduals, some admitting them to the full, while others 
seem scarcely sensible of their power. Yet still all, and 
especially those who occupy an intermediate ground, 
feel themselves to be liable, abstractedly, to the entire 
force of these motives; and any one of these persons, 
even the lowest on the scale of religious feeling, may, at 
any time, admit their fullest energy, and may move on- 
ward to a higher position, without obstruction. So it 
will be, if the natural order of things has not been dis- 
turbed; and in such a state of things the fervour and the 
attainments of the {ew^ intermingled with the many, ope- 
rate beneficially upon all. 

But now, if, in such a community, any artifidal line 
of demarcation is drawn around the few who are pre- 
sumed to have made great attainments, and farthermore, 
ii whatever is the most affecting in the Christian system 



UPON THE MASS OF CHRISTIANS. 499 

be assigned to these few, as their prerogative, then the 
many are at once mnlct of their shares in what had be- 
fore been common property, and, so long as they enter- 
tain no hope or intention of forcing their way within the 
narrow circle of privilege, they actually sustain a priva- 
tion of almost the whole of that influence which before 
had, in greater or less degrees, operated upon them, for 
their benefit. The more this artificial distinction be- 
tween the few and the many is abrupt, arbitrary, and 
difficult to be passed over, the more complete will be 
the consequent subtraction of spiritual warmth and light 
from the outer space. 

Let nothing more be done in any society of Christians 
than to make a rule that whoever professed eminent se- 
riousness should wear a hood, or a tassel to his cap; and, 
at the same time, let such a doctrine as this be con- 
stantly inculcated — That the virtue and piety of the *' un- 
hooded," or the *' untasseled " commonalty is always of 
an inferior quality; and let the custom prevail of never 
quoting the choicest passages of scripture, except as ap- 
plicable to the liveried aristocracy. The silent, but in- 
evitable consequence of such a system upon the minds 
of the many must be the almost total withdrawment of 
all efficacious motives, and a general subsidence of moral 
feeling, such as (if the few really justify their high pro- 
fession) leaves a vast interval between them and the 
many. In fact, there will soon be no middle and /io/^e- 
ful class, but only an alternative of rare sanctity (if it be 
sanctity indeed) and a wide waste of lifeless formality. 

Such, in fact, from the first, has been the condition o^ 
every community in which the monastic system has pre- 
vailed; nor is it easy to follow the history of this insti- 
tution, uniform as it is in its characteristics, without be- 
ing impressed with the belief that the Satanic craft has 



500 OPERATIOJS OF AN ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

had to do with the contrivance of the ascetic institute. 
Christianity, wherever it actually took effect, produced 
a moral revolution, so absolute and so amazing as to 
show that, if left unobstructed to pursue its course, every 
thing evil must give way before it. Nothing less than 
a familiar converse with pagan antiquity (or, instead of 
it, a few years' residence in the heart of Brahminical In- 
dia) can enable anyone to estimate the vastness, we 
might say the strangeness, of the change which the gos- 
pel was hastening to bring about. The early apologists, 
all of them, appeal triumphantly, and with the calm con- 
fidence of truth, to the moral renovation that was then 
in progress. The kingdom of the wicked one was visi- 
bly shaken; and new counsels must be followed, and 
new measures must be tried. The first endeavour was 
to crush the rising moral energy by calumnies and tor- 
tures; but these methods of open violence only added 
force to it. What then remained to be attempted? The 
arch-Ahithophel was not to be so soon bafiled, and he 
presently took a more wily, and a far more efijectual 
course. *' If we cannot fight with this new power upon 
the open field, we may do better: we may wall it in." 
In other words, the monastic scheme was suggested and 
set a going: the enemy found his ready agents within 
the church, and a proclamation was loudly made, on all 
sides, to this efi'ect — That all who aspired to perfection, 
after the model of the new and divine philosophy of 
Christ, should throw up their interests in tliis world's 
aff'airs, and shut themselves up in houses dedicated to 
sanctity and prayer! This device, notwithstanding the 
violence it did to human nature, took effect to an extent 
that could not have appeared probable. The wise and 
learned, as well as the simple, caught at the bait; and 
scarcely a voice of dissent was heard. In every part of 



UPON THE MASS OF CHRISTIANS, 501 

Christendom the regenerative force of Christianity was 
forthwith cloistered, and although the endeavour to ex- 
terminate the gospel had every where failed, the scheme 
which entombed it every where prospered. This view 
of the authorship of the ancient monastic system, as af- 
fecting the moral condition of the social mass, I must 
profess to entertain, deliberately and steadily; and do 
most seriously believe it to have been Satan's especial 
contrivance for restraining and hemming in the gospel, 
as to its diffusive moral influence. Not for a moment 
forgetting how much piety and beneficence has, at all 
times, been incarcerated within monastic walls, nor for- 
getting the many benefits which have incidentally re- 
sulted from these establishments, during ages of barbar- 
ism and violence, nevertheless, if the weighty question 
be put, concerning the monastic institute, Whence was 
it? I cannot for a moment hesitate to say — ''from be- 
neath." That specious scheme which the doctors and 
preachers of the Nicene age agreed to admire and ex- 
tend, was nothing else, as I firmly believe, but the devil's 
desperate device for retaining his hold of the mass of 
mankind, notwithstanding the presence of the gospeJ, 
which he had found it impossible to expel from the world 
by open force. 

If facts were adduced, illustrative of the actual condi- 
tion of the (so called) Christian nations in the fourth, fifths 
and sixth centuries, twenty causes might easily be named 
rather than the influence of the monastic institute, to 
which the general dissoluteness of manners might be at- 
tributed. Let us, however, consider (not to look far- 
ther) what must have been the eff'ect of the practice of 
jsetting the ascetic seal upon every text of the Bible 
which has any peculiar force or stress of meaning. It 

43 



502 OPERATION OF AN ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

would not easily be believed to what an extent this per- 
nicious practice prevailed. One is, indeed, amazed at 
the perverse ingenuity which was employed in carrying 
on this work of exegetical monopoly. Not content with 
assigning to the use of holy hermits, monks, and nuns, 
all the cream of scripture— its promises especially — and 
with giving a twisted application to every general pre- 
cept, the ascetic interpreters — I mean all the principal 
Nicene writers — took up even those preceptive portions 
of the New Testament which most clearly belong to 
Christians in common, and set them off for this bye use. 
It is thus that the rapacious never rest so long as any 
thing meets their eye which has not been appropriated. 
Let any number of intelligent persons (not initiated in 
the patristic chicanery) read the second, third, and fourth 
verses of the seventh chapter of the first epistle to the 
Corinthians, and I will venture to say that not one in a 
hundred of them would ever surmise any thing else than 
that the apostle is there intending to convey certain ad- 
vices to the married. No such thing, says a high au- 
thority; and this superficial interpretation we should re- 
gard as a specimen only of our protestant tampering 
with the mysteries of scripture. All that Paul here ad- 
dresses apparently to the married is really said, as Chry- 
sostom deliberately assures us, in terrorem, and for the 
express purpose of deterring Christians, male and fe- 
male, from matrimony! Marry — who would bring him- 
self, or herself, under so wretched a bondage? Why! — 
a married man hath, as the aposlle says, no longer any 
power over his own body! — nor halli a married woman 
any power over her own body, but has become the slave 
of another! — alas the fools who marry! and how wise are 
they who rather dedicate their bodies to Ilim whose ser- 
vice is perfect freedom! The passage may, indeed, says 
our expositor, at first sight, seem to have a lower and a 



UPON THE MASS OF CHRISTIANS. 503 

lenient meaning; but whoever considers it more atten- 
tively will perceive that the apostle's real intention is of 
a kind more worthy of himself, and of his argument!* 

Against a method of interpretation such as this, no 
principles of truth can stand; and in the use of it, any 
enormity may readily be substantiated. I would engage 
to adduce, very quickly, a hundred similar instances of 
crooked exposition. The effect was to cut off the wa- 
ters of the sanctuary, in their destined course, hither 
and thither, to bless the church and the world: the heal- 
ing streams, turned by a deep cross-cut into the mo- 
nastery, either stagnated in that turbid pool, or sunk 
away through bottomless quicksands. Thus it was that 
the gospel so faintly affected the European morals as 
that the Mahometan deluge came, where it came, as a 
cleansing inundation. If Mahomet, plagiarist as he was, 
had but included in his scheme the Jewish notions and 
usages relating to women, and had his religion embraced 
the purifying element of domestic virtue, it must, so far 
as we can calculate upon the operation of natural causes, 
have triumphed over the debased Christianity of the 
seventh century, which, as a system of religion, had be- 
come a frivolous idolatry, and which, as a moral system, 
or code of manners, had driven all natural sentiments 
from off their foundations. The degrading influence of 
the Mahometan polygamy, and of its doctrine of a vo- 
luptuous paradise, just served to balance the monkish 
enormities of Christendom, so as to leave with the lat- 
ter enough of advantage to enable it to hold its ground 
when borne upon by its rival. 

To exclude woman from the domestic and social cir- 
cle, is the same thing as to expel all virtue thence. A. 

* Chrysost. torn. i. pp, 351 — 354 > 



504 OPERATION OF AN ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

truism such as this, one would not have ventured to re- 
peat, now-a-days, did it not appear that there are those 
who are wishing to make a new experiment, with the 
view of hitching Christian morals up to a higher level, 
by again separating the sexes. This separation, if not 
the end immediately aimed at, yet follows as an inevita- 
ble consequence from the institute of celibacy; — it is a 
measure of discretion, quickly found to be indispensa- 
ble, when once the oriental doctrine of the sanctity of 
virginity has come to be preached among young people, 
and when once a choir of virgins, male and female, has 
been set off from the community. If these unfledged 
*« seraphs " are not to be literally incarcerated, after the 
Romish fashion — which incarceration is, in truth, no- 
thing but mercy and wisdom; then it will be found, not- 
withstanding the lofty style which the senior promoters 
of the scheme may think fit to use, an utterly impracti- 
cable thing to allow of their freely conversing, either 
with each other, or with their former associates in pro- 
miscuous society. The Nicene church tried this me- 
thod, and the consequence was- — just what any man in 
his senses would have predicted — the prevalence of 
abuses ineffably revolting. 

A middle course must then be followed; that is to say, 
if the temper of the times forbids the immuring of the 
*« professed," it must be silently understood that they are 
to be seen in society only as spectres, or only as a spec- 
tacle in " procession;" or only as the mute personages 
of a church pomp; or be it, as angels of mercy, flitting 
hither and thither, commendably indeed, among the 
wretched. But what has become of the once happy cir- 
cles whence these victims have been snatched? Not 
only will the domestic and general circle have lost their 
brightest ornaments — their '' first born " of virtue, puri- 



UPON THE MASS OF CHRISTIANS. 605 

ty, and piety — that is to say, the very individuals who, 
by native elevation of sentiment, and by a high tone of 
feeling, were the salt of the mass; but those who are 
left behind, thus orphaned, as we may say, are hence- 
forward condemned to look upon themselves, and upon 
one another, as a degraded class, or as the, reprobates of 
purity; nor can they feel, speak, or act, otherwise than 
under the extreme moral disadvantage of being robbed of 
the finer feelings of self-respect, and of mutual respect. 
What remains for them is to seek indemnifications, and 
these are to be sought, and may always be found, near 
at hand, in licentious or perilous freedoms of behaviour. 
The Christian father of a numerous and well- trained 
amily, finds (many such may soon find to their amaze- 
ment) that his ** Angelica," or his '' Prisciila," or his 
*' Agnes," having listened to the whispers and sighs of 
some apostle of church principles (whether stern and 
demure, or biilhe and seraphic) has actually dedicated 
herself,"^ in a word, has '• professed;" and if she has not 
taken an irreversible vow, has so pledged her conscience 
and honour, as that to draw back would be infamy. — 
Let it be so; the victim has bled; but can we believe 
that the '* Marthas," and the *' Annes," and the ''Eli- 
zabeths," of this despoiled family continue to occupy pre- 
cisely the same moral level that they did before?— Nay, 
they have been cruelly robbed, and without their fault, 
of the bloom of beauty, the grace and transparency, of 
their feminine honour. — Thenceforward they are to 
think themselves somewhat less than chaste and pure; 
for it is their seraphic sister only, who, as they are 

*To take this step against the v;ill and advice of parents, or 
without their knowledge, was an additional merit, with the Ni- 
cene doctors. 

43* 



506 OPERATION OF AN ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

taught, merits to be called so in any proper sense: but, 
for a woman to be brought to think of herself, and for 
her to know that she is thought of by others, as having, 
in any way, stepped down from the high place of wo- 
manly reverence which she once occupied, is, in fact, for 
her to be thrust down to a level where delicacy does not 
breathe at ease. The Marthas, and the Annes, and the 
Elizabeths of this family, whose common sense has 
stood in the way of their promotion, and who number 
themselves among such as may marry, find that the new 
code of morals which has got admittance among them 
has drawn a broad line through the once united band, 
and that, on the one side of it stands chastity, and vir- 
ginity, and angelic purity, and on the other side, where 
themselves are ranged, there is marriage, not forbidden, 
but just tolerated, and a little lower down, according to 
the Nicene scale — concubinage, and lower still, the se- 
veral grosser forms of licentiousness; and these fair vic- 
tims are then offered the alternative either of professing, 
with their sister; or — of standing associated with the im- 
pure. — Horrid mischief this! 

The practical meaning of religious celibacy, as an in- 
stitute, is — the degradation of woman ^' — her expulsion 
from general society — the lowering of manners and sen- 
timents among young persons universally— the setting 
married life off from the circle of the iiighest and best 
motives, and a general licentiousness diffused through 
the community. These consequences follow — they ever 
have followed, and it is easy to see how and why they 
must follow, from the celibate, even supposing the best, 

*I say nothing of the consequences of the celibate, as affect- 
ing the male sex — directly and indirectly. Those who know- 
something of monkish history will know why this branch of the 
subject must be passed in silence. 



UPON THE MASS OF CHRISTIANS. 507 

namely, that the ** professed" generally justify their 
high pretensions. But what happens when, as has in 
fact always been the case, monasteries and convents are 
known, by every body, to be sinks of pollution — the 
sewers of the open world, into which every thing de- 
scends that should shun the light! Shall we dare to ima- 
gine the effect that would be produced upon our English 
manners, supposing the celibate to be restored — under 
any imaginable modifications — and supposing that, after 
Ihe first (e\v years of fresh enthusiasm, it became, in 
frequent and notorious instances, just what we find it in 
ihe Nicene age, as described by Chrysostom's monaste- 
ries and convents, dispersed through the country, would 
breathe pestilence enough to reduce England, quickly, to 
the level of Spain and Italy; and meantime every think- 
ing man in the land, would have become aji infidel. 

"Yes, but," say the promoters of church principles, 
" we shall know how to obviate these extreme abuses: 
we shall go to work on a better-considered plan, and 
shall be provided against certain foreseen inconveniences. 
True — provision may be made against the shameless 
licentiousness of the Nicene monkery; — things inay be 
better managed than they were then, and they have 
been; and it has been found possible to screw the sys- 
tem up much tighter than was at first attempted. But 
then this was done by the means which the church of 
Rome employs. The Romish monastic economy — none 
of its rigours excepted, is the only condition under which 
the celibate can be endured: and this is what we must 
come to. The learned and zealous persons who are 
now recommending celibacy and asceticism, well know 
that their present endeavours, public and private, can 
have no other end; and that they themselves do not re- 
coil from such an issue, has become manifest. 



508 INFLUENCE OF THE MONASTIC INSTITUTE 



THE INDIRECT INFLUENCE OF THE MO- 
NASTIC INSTITUTE UPON THE POSITIOxN 
OF THE CLERGY. 

No reader of ecclesiastical literature can need much to 
be said in proof of the assertion that the ascetic doctrine, 
and the institutions thence resulting, powerfully affected 
the temper, conduct, and official position of the clergy, 
in the Nicene age, as well as in later periods. In truth, 
it might be broadly affirmed, that monkery without and 
monkery within the hierarchical enclosure, comprise the 
sum and substance of church history, through many 
centuries. What it may be requisite to advance, on this 
subject, presents itself under these two general heads, 
namely — the indirect influence of the extra-clerical mo- 
nastic establishments upon the position and character of 
the clergy;— and the direct effect of the usage of celiba- 
cy, upon the clergy themselves, and upon their relations 
with the laity. We take then the first of these topics, 
which embraces the following affirmations — That tlie as- 
cetic orders — the virgins, monks, anchorets, constituted 
what may be called an ecclesiastical substratum^ serving 
to give breadth, support, and altitude, to the ecclesiastical 
structure — -That these orders were a class to be main- 
tained, and therefore swelled the amount of funds ad- 
ministered by the clergy — 'j'hat they were also a class 
largely contributing to those funds; and, 'i'hat they were 
a class to be governed, and to be made use of, as aids 
and instruments in governing the laity, 

A calm inquirer concerning the origin of episcopacy, 
is liable to be at first, not a little discouraged (if his pre- 
dilections are in favour of that institution) by the clear 



rPON THE POSITION OF THE CLERGY. 509 

indications which meet him, on every side, of the stre- 
nuous endeavours of the ancient church to create for it- 
self, and to consolidate, a complex hierarchical scheme, 
which, from an ample base, should tower to a proud 
height. Very manifest it is, that the Pontifex — the so- 
vereign bishop, was to be seated at the apex of a lofty 
pyramid: hence the long list of church functionaries, 
and dependents, all, to the last and the lowest, personally 
interested in the support of the ecclesiastical edifice; 
and all looking up to the throne, as the fountain of ho- 
nour and emolument. The facts, looked at in this light, 
give rise to a prejudice against episcopacy; and the most 
impartial mind may easily conceive a disgust, which 
would lead to a too hasty conclusion, a conclusion not 
sustained (as I humbly believe) by the evidence, when 
it comes to be more strictly analyzed. 

Nevertheless, while we exempt the primitive episco- 
pacy from the prejudice incidentally resulting from the 
facts adverted to, it is most evident that, at a very early 
time, great anxiety was manifested, and great industry 
used, tending to bring about what we find existing, in a 
settled form, in the Nicene age, namely — a complicated 
and broadly-bottomed hierarchical structure, which, 
while it furnished dignities, occupation, maintenance, 
and emoluments, to a large proportion of the Christian 
body, gave a decisive preponderance, ordinarily, to the 
clergy, as balanced against the laity. Particular cir- 
cumstances allowed for, it would naturally happen that 
all who had a common interest with the clergy, would 
be found to stand on their side, and would sustain them, 
in any instance of contention with the people: — the peo- 
ple were in fact out-voted, and having been robbed of 
their proper representatives, and their due influence, by 
the insidious absorption into the clerical body of those 



510 INFLUENCE OF THE MONASTIC INSTITUTE 

who should have acted as their tribunes, and retaining 
no control whatever over the funds of the church, they 
were either dealt with, at pleasure, by the sacerdotal col- 
lege, or, as is usual in despotic governments, they ex- 
pressed their will, and inspired some necessary fear, on 
signal occasions, in the irregular and dangerous mode of 
tumultuary proceedings, and of open violence— the na- 
tural remedies against usurpations of whatever kind. 

The stability of a hierarchy (or of any monarchy) in 
its relations towards the people, and the power of the 
single chief toward the various members of the hierar- 
chy itself, (or the aristocracy) alike demand not merely 
a numerous and diversified body of functionaries, regu- 
larly subordinated, from the highest to the lowest; but 
also, one or more collateral bodies, which, while con- 
stituting a portion of the whole, shall yet have a real 
independence, in respect of all but the highest^ authori- 
ties. This appears to be the secret of the monarchical 
constitution, civil, or religious; nor has any monarchy 
actually stood long, which has not so rested a portion 
of its weight upon side buttresses. Now, while the 
several ranks of the clergy, and the inferior church 
officers, down to the porters, and the sweepers of the 
aisles, constituted the bishop's ordinary state, he, and 
the few who worked the machine of government under 
his immediate control, felt a want, which was at length, 
and gradually, supplied. From how slender and unsight- 
ly a collection of materials, was that prodigious mass 
prepared which has in fact proved the real prop of the 
church, through the tempests of many centuries! A 
pitiable company of desolate old women, were, if we 
may say so, the rubble of the mole, which has propped 
the papacy from age to age. 

There is reason to believe that, in the ancient world, 



UPON THE POSITION OF THE CLERGY. 511 

perilous as were many ordinary employments, now com- 
paratively safe, dangerous as were navigation and land 
travelling, murderous as was war, reckless as were all 
governments of human life and welfare, prodigal of blood 
as were the public amusements, horrid as were the 
usages of slavery, and withal, wanting as was antiquity 
in the medical and surgical care of the lower classes — 
the average mortality of the male sex as compared with 
the other, vastly exceeded its proportion in modern 
times. And whereas, even now, widows are always 
many more than widowers, in ancient times, the num- 
ber of women whose husbands had been snatched from 
them by violent and accidental deaths, was so great as 
that these ''destitutes'^ constituted a class, so considera- 
ble as to attract peculiar regard. Heathenism might 
indeed take little account of its widows and orphans; 
but the gospel instantly brought them forward, as the 
especial objects of the regard of the church. The first, 
or one of the first duties of a primitive Christian society, 
was to take care of its widows; and as the tendency of 
all things, connected with a social economy, is, for what 
was at first incidental and liable to the guidance of occa- 
sions, to settle down into the fixed form of a regulated 
constitution, it was not long before the widows of the 
church, numerous as they were, came to make a stand- 
ing class, or permanent order, situated, as we may say, 
on one side of the hierarchical structure. In what way 
this class, with others similar, affected the bishop's 
power, as patron and fundholder, we shall presently see. 
Apart from this financial bearing of the widow-band, 
the appendage of a company of helpless women, miglit 
seem to add little that was enviable to episcopal gran- 
deur; — but with it, the consequences \vere important. 
Give to any one nothing better than an irresponsible 



512 INFLUENCE OF THE MONASTIC INSTITUTE 

oversight of the poor, with power to levy for their main- 
tenance, and you have made him a considerable per- 
sonage in the state. 

But the widow-band served, very early, as the ground 
for a more important and sightly structure; — as bundles 
of lithe rushes, and sear sticks are used to be laid upon 
a bog to sustain better materials. Next came, and at a 
very early date, as we have already seen, the illustrious- 
company of dedicated virgins — ^a body collateral to the^ 
hierarchy, and independent, at once, of the people, and 
of the inferior clergy, and yet (generally) subject to the- 
bishop, through the means of the most influential among 
the presbyters. The regards of the people toward the- 
widows, we cannot suppose to have been of a kind to* 
involve much reverence; but their regards — the regards 
they were constantly taught to entertain toward the vir-- 
gins, carried sentiments of awe and deference; and this 
credit they could lend when it was needed, to him who, 
on particular occasions, might wish to borrow it. Thus 
was the hierarchical structure, even in times of suffering 
and depression, acquiring, not merely altitude, but a 
great breadth of base. 

A little later, as it seems, the order of male virgins, or 
monks and eremites, encrusted itself about the churchy 
nor was it long before this body swelled to such a mag- 
nitude, and acquired so portentous an influence, with 
the mass of the people, as to give it rather too much of 
independent consequence. Still, however, in the main, 
the monasteries, thickly sprinkled as they were, over 
the surface of Christian countries, constituted so many 
forts and citadels of ecclesiastical power, under the com- 
mand of the highest authorities, and altogether indepen- 
dent of the lower clergy, and of the people. On several 
recorded occasions these sombre garrisons swarmed out^ 



UPON THE POSITION OF THE CLERGY. 513 

in thousands, to the terror of their opponents, and to 
the effective aid of their patrons. Can we then be 
amazed at the zeal of the church authorities, in pro- 
moting, as they did, the ascetic doctrine? are we at a 
loss in accounting for the fact, at first so strange, that 
men of the highest intelligence, men of learning, and 
knowledge of the world, should so have vilified them- 
selves as they did, by trumpeting monkish exploits, and 
by repeating, with all gravity, the most insufi'erable non- 
sense, tending to glorify the ascetic life in the eyes of a 
besotted populace? Nothing is more easily understood 
than this course of things. We should do the rulers of 
the Nicene church a great injustice if we were to think 
them so simple as not to have understood, in measure, 
what they were about, while so assiduously employed 
in heaping up the materials, and in pouring in the cement, 
which, at length, rendered the ascetic institute the im~ 
moveable buttress of church powder. And yet w^e 
must not impute to them too much foresight in this in- 
stance; for it is not often given to men to sit down and 
deliberately to devise those schemes of power which are 
to be ripened in a long course of years. But w^hen once^ 
a course of ambition has been opened before a society, 
or body of men in power, then there are always found 
minds quick to discern, and prompt in availing them- 
selves of, M'hatever presents itself as fit to promote their 
designs. The chiefs of the church did not, in the first 
instance, plan the ascetic institute, as the most proper 
means for establishing a vast system of spiritual despot- 
ism; but — asceticism ofll'ering itself to them, just when 
every extrinsic aid was needed, it was eagerly seized 
upon, and industriously turned to the best account. If 
there were any planning in this instance, we must look 

44 



514 INFLUENCE OF THE MONASTIC INSTITUTE 

beyond the Circle of human agency for the designing 
party. 

Still more caution is needed when we come to advance 
any general statements concerning the influence of mer- 
cenary motives, with men professing to be actuated by 
the loftier principles of religion. What we need, in 
such cases, is not merely candour, but a wise recollec- 
tion of that confused condition of mind which so often 
belongs to men of ordinary quality, who, while they 
think they intend only what is holy and honest, are 
tacitly governed by very inferior considerations. It is 
but few men who, habitually and severely, question 
themselves as to their real motives: and public men do so, 
perhaps, less often than others. Men may be pursuing a 
course, such as might have been dictated by the lust of 
wealth, without in fact being mercenary knaves; for 
there w^ere, in their .view, other, and better motives, on 
which they kept their eye fixed, while their hands were 
busy in sweeping gold and silver, like usurers into their 
bags. 

Now, with these considerations before us, we need 
call no ill names, while we look to ihe financial bearing 
of the ascetic institute, upon the ancient church system; 
and especially upon the position of the ruling clergy. 

The church then, and it was its glory, had under its 
wing a very numerous body of pensioners; — that is to 
say, the poor generally, and many reduced to want \\\ 
times of persecution — the widows, as a distinct class, 
and the virgins also as a class; and all were to be pro- 
vided for, in one mode or another: and the people, re- 
cognising tlie duty of making this provision, and know- 
ing to how serious an extent the bishop was constantly 
responsible, could not leave him slenderly furnished with 
the necessary means. The church chest, whence also 



UPON THE POSITION OF THE CLERGY. 515 

th€ clergy themselves drew their incomes, must be a 
deep one; and in fact it often enclosed enormous amounts 
in money, plate, jewels, and costly apparel. The bishop's 
patronage therefore, and his power and consequence as 
steward of ample revenues, and as the guardian, often, 
of fortunes, came to be, at an early time, very great; 
and it is easy to see that this power and patronage were 
directly enhanced by every addition made to the perma- 
nent pensionary establishment, Cyprian then, was quite 
right, in an economic sense (though, perhaps, he did not 
distinctly mean as much) when he said that the glory of 
mother cliurx^h bore proportion to the numbers included 
in the choir of virgins. There is no mystery in all this; 
none but the most ordinary connexions of cause and ef- 
fect are involved; and yet so obvious a bearing of the 
celibate institution upon the power and influence of the 
clergy has been very little regarded. 

But tlien the church virgins were not merely a class 
to be maintained; for they were, or some of them, large 
contributors to the church chest. This fact, too, has 
been much less regarded than it deserves. Woman has 
a noble, as well as a warm heart, and when once she 
has admitted the influence of powerful and elevating mo- 
tives, she gives, after a princely sort— yea, " all her 
living;" whether it be " two mites," or lands and houses 
and thousands of gold and silver. Many noble ladies 
were among the earliest converts; and the gospel conti- 
nued to draw such into the church; and these, as if they 
had been conscious of the blessings which the sex at 
large should at length owe to Christianity, '* brought an 
oflfering," like that of the eastern mages, to lay at their 
Saviour's feet. Are we then invidiously and coldly 
blaming this liberality? God forbid: whether always 



516 INFLUENCE OF THE MONASTIC INSTITUTE 

controlled by discretion, or not, it afforded a signal in- 
stance of the quality and power of Christ's doctrine. 

In the earliest times, and while large sums were re- 
quired for redeeming and maintaining sufferers for con- 
science sake, these ample donations, or sequestrations, 
found a proper employment; and perhaps did not greatly 
exceed the real wants of the church; but when, and at 
the same moment, the season of tranquillity came, and 
the monastic system assumed a regular form — when the 
ascetic enthusiasm being at its height, wealthy converts 
were taught to think that the noblest of all modes of em- 
ploying the mammon of unrighteousness, was to build 
and endow religious houses, what could happen but that 
the stewards and administrators of church funds, and ge- 
nerally all who drew their incomes from the common 
chest, should be exposed to a terrible temptation to make 
a trade of the holiest things? Much need not be said on 
so obvious a point. Whether the monasteries and con- 
vents which, chiefly in this very mode, sprung up so 
thickly over all the Christian surface, in the fourth and 
fifth centuries, were financially independent of the neigh- 
bouring churches, or were placed under the bishop's 
immediate control, the general result would be the same. 
Vast wealth was continually flowing over, from the w^orld 
to the church. The religious body was, every day, 
gaining upon the secular body. The church had made 
excavations, deep and wide, here and there, and every 
where; and into these pits there was a constant drain- 
age; and every commotion of the social system threw 
into them a new flood, charged with precious matters. 

While therefore the church presented to the eye of the 
people abroad front of eleemosynary demand — its poor, 
its widows, its confessors, its virgins, its monks, and the 
clergy themselves, and all to be supported by the people, it 



UPON THE POSITION OF THE CLERGY. 617 

Nvas in fact silently becoming the steward, under various 
conditions, of many entire private fortunes. But could 
such things happen without producing a reflective effect 
upon tlie religious sentiments and manners of the men 
most nearly concerned? Can we believe it? or can we 
believe that the singular animation which marks the style 
of the Nicene orators, when they are lauding the mo- 
nastic life, received no heightening from the unconfessed 
influence of inferior motives? — Inferior and unworthy 
motives seem endowed with a sort of tact and sense of 
propriety, impelling them to skulk into the dark corners 
of men's minds, where, without attracting any notice, or 
making any noise, they may, with a soft finger, press 
the springs of action, or ease the moral machinery, just 
at the moment when such interpositions seem needed: — 
a prince's most needed, and least honoured attendants, 
know how to do their office, noiselessly, and to keep 
out of view. 

There can be no need offensively to impugn the inte- 
grity of men whom, nevertheless, it were absurd not to 
think of as much influenced by motives which it w^ould 
be an insult loudly to attribute to them. In connexion 
with our immediate subject, nothing more is requisite 
than to bear in mind the simple fact, that the ascetic in- 
stitute did, as well in its earlier, as in its later form, that 
is to say, as well in the middle of the third century, as 
at tlie end of the fourth, and onwards, very materially, 
and very dangerously affect the pecuniary position of 
the clergy; and that, at length, it became the principal 
means of so enriching the church as to make her the 
mistress of the world's afl'airs. It is then a sheer infa- 
tuation to cite seraphic hymns, and glowing orations, 
concerning the '^ angelic life," and to forget the homely 

44* 



6l8 INFLUENCE OP THE MONASTIC INSTITUTE 

import of the entire system, in pounds, shillings, and 
pence. 

Bat again: the ascetic institute, or, to speak of it in 
the concrete, the companies of monks, nuns, and eremites, 
were bodies to be governed, and engines to be worked. 
The clergy, and especially the more eloquent members 
of the body, commended the ascetic life, in the hearing 
of the people, who were taught to look upon those who 
professed it, as superhuman beings: in return, these un- 
earthly personages gave their weight, as required, to the 
clergy, and actually moved on, in phalanx, when pe- 
culiarly needed: the ascetics constituted a corps de re- 
serve, which the church might summon to her aid in 
critical moments. Under ordinary circumstances, as is 
easy to understand, these recluses, drawn as they were 
from the bosoms of families, and trained to silence toward 
the world, and to unlimited disclosures toward their spi- 
ritual guides, were the fittest instruments of that sort of 
clandestine management, by means of which the clergy 
may exercise a terrible despotism over private life. 
No family that had a daughter or a sister in the choir 
of virgins, could be exempt from anxieties. All this 
is well understood in catholic countries; but then, in 
the Nicene age, the license that prevailed, among the 
ascetics, left a much wider scope for this sort of dumb 
tyranny: the nuns not being actually incarcerated, might 
worm themselves through all the crevices of society, and, 
at the same time, as they habitually "confessed" to the 
clergy, and received instructions from them, they might 
be employed to effect any nefarious purpose. 

But what shall we say of that influence upon the 
morals and manners of the clergy — an unmarried clergy, 
which resulted from the access allowed them to con- 
vents? The less that is said on such a theme the better; 



UPON THE POSITION OF THE CLERGY. 519 

yet it is indispensable to place it, in its outline at least, 
before the reader. If the worst enemy of the church — 
if its infernal enemy, were supposed to have had the 
opportunity to devise a plan most certain to corrupt it, 
what better could he have done, than, first, to stir deeply 
the sensibilities of human nature; then to impose celibacy 
on both sexes; then to screen both from the eye of the 
world; and then to allow the one free access to the other, 
under pretext of spiritual superintendence! Need any 
thing more be said? Are we to think such a constitution 
of things to have been the contrivance of infinite wisdom 
and goodness? Grant that paganism has established 
what was as bad; but certainU^ it has sanctioned nothing 
worse. Under a luxurious climate, in countries where 
inveterate licentiousness had brought all sentiments and 
habits down to the lowest level, young women at the 
earliest age were snatched from their homes — the only 
places then w^here modesty still took refuge; they were 
congregated in dim seclusions, where they received 
visits from unmarried men, to whom, moreover, and in 
hours of tremulous excitement, they were to expose the 
inmost secrets of their hearts! This is that scheme 
which we are to admire, and to emulate, and to set 
a going afresh among ourselves! 



THE DIRECT INFLUENCE OF THE CELI- 
BATE UPON THE CLERGY. 

We have only to follow the inevitable course of 
things, a very little way, and it will become evident 
that what has actually happened, could not but have 
happened, and must always, unless under the most ex- 
traordinary circumstances, happen wherever the princi- 



520 DIRECT INFLUENCE Or THE CELIBATE 

pie of the ascetic life is embraced. — The doctrine that 
celibacy is a higher and a holier state than matrimony,* 
and that it is " a more excellent way," and that virginity, 
as the fathers constantly express it, places a man near 
lo God, is, let ns suppose, broached in a Christian com- 
munity, and it is put forward, whether modestly, or fa- 
natically, so as to enchain ardent minds. Such, instantly 
profess this angelic excellence: — the people (not taught 
better) admire and applaud the specious instance of fer- 
vour and self-devotion; they gaze with awe and affection 
upon the '' holy " youth, or virgin; and this awe is just 
so much respect withdrawn from those, however excel- 
lent they may be, who fall short of so high a standard. 
But can there be any element of sanctity which is not 
eminently to be desired in those who administer holy 
things? The people will feel this congruity, and the 
ardent and ambitious among the clergy will keenly feel 
it too; and although other means of popularity should be 
^vanting, this at least is at hand: — the weak and enthu- 
siastic, as well as the haughty and aspiring, will snatch 
at the distinction, and there will soon be a band of 
" holy " priests and deacons, who by the aid of the very 
qualities which have impelled them to walk on so ar- 
duous a path, will soon draw towards themselves the 
warmest feelings of the devout portion of the community. 
When things have proceeded thus far, many, who had 
been insensible to powerful and primary motives, will 
yield to such as are secondary; and they also will " pro- 
fess." 

Thus the band of the ''chaste" will gradually have 
swollen to such a magnitude, as to disturb the equilibrium 
of feeling throughout the church: a new mode of speak- 
ing will have come in, adapted to this altered state of 

* Letter to the Bishop of Oxford, pp. 208, 213. 



UPON THE CLERGY. 521 

things; — " marriage is lawful^ no doubt; to say otherwise 
were heretical; — but yet how angelic is chastity — and 
how fit is it, that those who wear spotless wliite, at the 
altar, should also be inwardly and personally white! 
Whenever it is possible, let us receive .the holy sacra- 
ment from holy hands." When once this comes to be 
said, or felt, by the devout, the fate of the church is 
sealed. Married priests rest, thenceforward, under an 
obloquy; — they are not indeed driven from the altar; but 
they gladly give place there to those who can lift an m> 
blushing front to heaven. More and more go over to the 
privileged companj^ and while indemnifying themselves 
as they may, and all but a few i^^iY/ indemnify themselves, 
will yet claim in public, the honours of continence, and 
join in decrying, as sensual, the married priest. When 
it comes to be understood that it is marriage, and not 
profligacy that is condemned, none but the few who re- 
tain some sense of virtue and piet}'- will subject them- 
selves to contempt for the mere sake of being able to 
call the woman they live with — wife. At length it is 
felt to be a measure, at once of discretion and of mercy, 
not to say necessity, Xo forbid universally, what has be- 
come the occasion of scandal and of invidious distinc- 
tions: the last step therefore is taken, and holy celibacy^ 
joining hands with detestable vices, celebrates its triumph. 
Fanaticism proclaims a high day, and blows her seven 
trumpets of — lust, hypocrisy, cruelty, blasphemy, infi- 
delity, madness, and misery; and the church thencefor- 
ward sits enthroned upon the overthrown decencies of 
domestic life, and is encircled by an unmarried priest- 
hood, the ministers and patterns of all evil. The social 
system then putrefies to the core, and the poison of its 
corruption sheds death on every side. In various de- 
grees of aggravation, such have always, and in all coun- 



522 DIRECT INFLUENCE OF THE CELIBATE 

tries, been the consequences of clerical celibacy; and 
clerical celibacy is the inevitable consequence of the 
doctrine that the virgin state is more holy than the mar- 
ried. 

Whether we. speak of these things problematically, as 
what must happen, or historically, as what has always 
happened, is indifferent to onr argument: the connexion 
of the effect with its cause is of the most intimate and 
inseparable sort; nor can any exceptions be produced 
that should affect our conclusion. So \o\\^ as relio^ious 
celibacy rests upon the plain ground of utility, it w^ill 
keep within narrow bounds, and the practice may be 
exempt from peril; but the moment it is propounded as 
an object of spiritual ambition, or as a lofty distinction, 
many motives, and some of them of a very impure kind, 
will come into play, impelling multitudes to snatch this 
glory, who have sadly mistaken their personal call. — 
Only one course of events can then follow — namely, the 
prevalence of frightful abuses. If religious celibacy be 
a glory and a beauty, in itself, the clergy must not leave 
this advantage to the laity. This were as if the bright- 
est military courage — the freshest laurels of war, ne- 
glected by the officers in an army, were left to be the 
distinction of the privates. Then \{ some of the clergy 
arrogate this professional virtue, all must at length pre- 
tend to it. The doctrine of Tertullian and of Cyprian, 
is the alpha in a series, to which Hildebrand subjoined 
the omega; and the modern favourers of antiquity are 
setting a going again, that which, should it proceed, can 
have no other end. 

A small portion of men only will (moments of excite- 
ment excepted) adhere virtuously to a vow of continence: 
to expect any thing else is ridiculously absurd. But 
even if the proportion were large, as it possibly mighi 



UPON' THE CLERaV. 523 

become for a time, and under unusual circumstances of 
religious animation, or of proselyting zeal, it remains to 
inquire what the effects of celibacy are upon the dispo- 
sitions of the clergy — even supposing the best that can 
be imagined. This is a trite subject. .Unavoidably, the 
ministers of religion are so far set off from the influence 
of ordinary motives, as to involve some peril to their hu- 
mility, their candour, and their good sense; but to sever 
them from the social mass violently, by celibacy, is to 
aggravate, tenfold, ail the ill tendencies of their position, 
and to render them morose, selfish, arrogant, prurient, 
trivial, fanatical, and perversely ambitious; in a word- 
to induce habits and dispositions the most pernicious in 
their bearing upon private life, and dangerous in the 
highest degree to the state. The history of Europe has 
abundantly established these general principles, which 
few now dispute. 

The Lord best knows what human nature is; and he 
has otherwise determined for his ministers than that 
they should want the salutary and softening influences 
of domestic life; and here we come to a decisive instance 
in which the explicit law of God being violently and 
without shame contradicted and set aside by the deci- 
sions of the church, a choice must be made between the 
two authorities. On this particular ground, as I humbly 
venture to predict, the Oxford Tract church principles 
wqll either win a signal triumph — a triumph fatal to 
Christianity and to England — -or they will meet their 
merited fate, and give their last sigh to the unpitying 
winds. Feeling well, as they must, how critical this 
question is, the promoters of Nicene Christianity will 
hardly do otherwise than evade a premature trial of their 
strength in respect to it. At the present moment, for 
them to say all they mean, and clearly to propound all 



524 DIRECT INFLUENCE OF THE CELIBATE 

they wish to see effected, would instantly bring hundreds 
of their disciples to iheir senses. Not, indeed, that 
these divines intend the remoter consequences of the 
course they are pursuing; but they intend that which 
must infallibly induce those consequences. 

It is peculiarly desirable that this momentous disso- 
nance between church principles and New Testament 
authority should be calmly regarded. Virginity is, says 
the church, a holy condition, and a Ihik of connexion 
between the human and the divine nature. Oar Lord 
has consecrated it; and its high patroness is the Ever- 
Yirgin-Mother, the Blessed Mary. Catholic antiquity 
gives it suffrage in favour of this doctrine, with uncom- 
mon animation and unanimity; and how pleasing, nay, 
glorious, is the notion, and how enviable the privilege 
and the honour of those who walk on earth as angels^ 
and who, although in the body, have renounced its hu- 
miliations! But then, if things be so, it would be cruel 
and impious to exclude the clergy — the very ministers 
of heaven — from this arena of celestial merit. No canons 
eould effect any such exclusion. All the most lofty- 
minded of the clergy must seize this distinction; and the 
Yery persons whom the church would wish to see in 
the seat of authority will, as a matter of course, be un- 
married men. If sacerdotal dignity were always con- 
ferred by the rule of professional merit, bishops, (under 
such a state of things as we are now supposing) would 
be chosen almost always from the band of virgin pres* 
byters. 

Here, then, we directly confront a clear, positive, and 
reiterated divine enactment. This should be looked to. 
The present advocates of church principles assume it as 
one of their principles that things which are only once^ 
ar incidentally and very slightly alluded to by the ia- 



UPON THE CLERGY. 525 

spired writers, may, nevertheless, be absolutely binding 
upon the church. Let us, then, take this ground, and 
we must admit that, notwithstanding any general infe- 
rence to the contrary, if nothing more had been said in 
all the New Testament concerning the marriage of sacer- 
dotal persons than what is dropped (and " near not to 
have been dropped") by Paul, when he asks, "what, 
may we not lead about a sister, a wife?" &c., that even 
in that case the liberly of clerical matrimony would have 
been secured. This cannot be denied by those who pro- 
fess the principle above mentioned. 

But, now, so it is, that no circumstance or condition 
of the ecclesiastical constitution established by the apos- 
tles has been more explicitly, or more formally specified 
than this, of the domestic qualificaiions of church offi- 
cers, supreme and subordinate. The apostolic rule 
would nearly justify the maxim — No husband, no bishop. 
If episcopacy itself had been as clearly enjoined as is 
the marriage of bishops and deacons, there would pro- 
bably never have been a question on the subject. Timo- 
tliy and Titus are authoritatively addressed on subjects 
specially clerical, and they are formally instructed how 
they are to behave themselves in "the house of God;" 
and, particularly, they are told wliat sort of men they 
ought to elevate to the most responsible stations. No 
doubt, then, we shall hear the apostle say— the apostle 
whom we have heard recommending celibacy — " al- 
though bishops and deacons are not to be prohibited 
from marrying, yet, whenever it can be done, it is well 
to give a preference to those who have professed virgi- 
nity; for, besides that no man who warreth entangleth 
himself with the things of this life, celibacy is a holier 
and a higher condition." Does not the inspired text 
run thus? Strange that it should not! Ought we not to 

45 



526 DIRECT INFLUENCE OF THE CELIBATE 

eall the reading in question, when we find so flagrant a 
contradiction of primitive doctrine and practice — abisliop 
to be a husband!- — a bishop to be one who has children 
about him! — the deacons too— and their wives — and 
again — a bishop blameless ^ and yet a iiusband; a bishop 
a pattern of piety, and yet surrounded with chiklren! 

Not one word is there in these clerical epistles, of 
" the merit of virginity," not a hint that celibacy is at 
least a " seemly thing" in those who minister at the al- 
tar! The very contrary is wliat w^e find there. A 
bishop's and a deacon's qualifications for ofhce are di- 
rectly connected with their behaviour as married men^ 
and as fathers. So pointed is this assumed connexion, 
that we might even consider the apostle's rule as amount- 
ing to a tacit exclusion of the unmarried from the sacer- 
dotal ofiice. If a man who does not ''rule well" his 
family, is thereby proved to be unfit to assume the go- 
vernment of the church; by implication then, those are 
to be judged unfit, or at least they are unproved as fit, 
who have no families to govern. — The meager, heart- 
less, nerveless, frivolous, or abstracted and visionary 
coelebs — make him a bishop! The very last thing he is 
fit for: — let him rather trim the lamps and open the 
church doors, or brush cobwebs from the ceiling! — how 
should such a one be a father to the church? 

And in these same epistles, wherein the married state 
is formally specified and demanded as a qualification for 
church office, the very illusions under the influence of 
which the church ran counter to the apostolic decision, 
are plainly predicted, and solemnly condemned. Not 
one of the superstitions or abuses of popery has been 
so clearly foreseen, and proscribed, as is that clerical ce- 
libacy which the ancient church, almost instantly after 
the death of the apostles, favoured, and at length firmly 
established. 



UPON THE CLERGY. 527 

On Ibis point, immensely important as it is, the autho- 
rity of scripture, and that of the fathers, are directly 
at issue; — the one authority explicitly enjoining the very 
thing which the other discourages, condemns, and at 
length absolutely forbids. There is no middle ground 
to be taken here: there is no room to evade the practical 
question; for it touches the main pillar of the ecclesias- 
tical edifice. Either it is good that a bishop should be 
a husband and a father, or it is not good. The Nicene 
church, as well in theory as in practice, decides that it 
is not good; nor could it, consistently with its princi- 
ples, come to any other decision. — In a word, the first 
principle of Nicene Christianity is found to be subver- 
sive, as well in theory as in practice, of apostolical Chris- 
tianity. The two systems diverge from their starting 
points, and get wider asunder, at every step of their 
course. 

A principle so simple as that it may be propounded 
in seven words, and which, as so propounded, seems to 
contradict no other, may appear to be a very unfit object 
of serious reprehension. But let us only follow it out, 
in its practical interpretation, and we may soon come 
to think otherwise of its importance. We are told that 
— " The preference of celibacy, as the higher state, is 
scriptural, and as being such, is primitive." We utter- 
ly deny any such assertion; but if it were granted, this 
at least would be certain, that this "preferable and 
higher state, was not, in the apostolic age, to be desired 
or sought after by those who were to be the *' ensamples 
to the flock:" on the contrary, such were to set an ex- 
ample of virtue and wisdom, as husbands and as fathers. 
Bishops and deacons were to relinquish this '' sanctity," 
together with the celestial distinctions belonging to it; 
and they were to walk on a lower path — a path where 



628 DIRECT INFLUENCE OF THE CELIBATE 

they were liable to be looked down upon by the celes- 
tial band. But can we think that any such element of 
insubordination was intended by Paul to be dropped 
into the ecclesiastical constitution? The ancient church 
could not suppose it, and in adopting as it did the sera- 
phic doctrine, it felt that the reverence of the people to- 
ward the clergy could not be secured, if these were ex- 
cluded from the honours attaching to the " higher and 
holier " state. But grant them leave to profess virginity, 
and then the doctrine itself comes out in the form of a 
direct violation of the apostolic injunction. If bisiiops 
and deacons are allowed to choose '' the more excellent 
way" — and how cruel were it not to grant them this in- 
dulgence! — then bishops and deacons will not ordinarily 
be married men. In other words, whoever is the most 
devoted, the most fervent, the most self-denying, and 
therefore, so far, the most fit for office, will be one who 
is not what Paul declares a bishop and deacon ought to 
be — a married man, and a father. 

Say what we please about the enforceme^it of celibacy, 
this open contrariety between scripture, and an as- 
cetic church, must always present itself loyig before the 
enforcement could be thought of as practicable or desi- 
rable. Only let it now be attempted, without any pre- 
paration of public opinion, to enforce celibacy upon the 
English clergy. As easily lift the halls and colleges 
of Oxford from their basements, and found them on the 
clouds. But if first, the "primitive" doctrine could be 
brought into favour with the clergy and the laity, and if 
it were so far to prevail as that many of the clergy pro- 
fessed the "higher state," and that married men were 
seldom or never ordained, and that a shade of discredit, 
or more, rested upon the married clergy, then an eccle- 
siastical ordinance, enjoining upon all, what most ac* 



TJPON THE CLERGY. 529 

lually practised, and what the people had come to con- 
sider as becoming, might be nothing more than a mea- 
sure of prudence. What, in such a case, could be more 
absurdly unjust, than to throw all the blame upon the last 
act of the church, while the doctrine and the practices 
which had led to this last act, were applauded. At the 
worst, this enforcement could be considered only as a 
stretch of power, outrunning a little the demands of pub- 
lic feeling. 

But now, let the explicit authority of the apostle, 
speaking as in the name of the Lord, be left untouched; 
and let it be held, not merely as allowable, but as pro- 
per and desirable — -we might say, indispensable, that 
bishops and deacons should be husbands and fathers (or 
should have been such) let the people be taught to look 
to their pastors as examples of married purity, and of 
paternal authority and love; — let the happy home of a 
Christian minister be regarded as his best sermon;^ — let 
true holiness take the place of a prurient, hollow, sanc- 
timoniousness; and then it will be found utterly imprac- 
ticable to make any thing of the ''primitive doctrine" 
of virginity — the bubble v/ill burst as often as it is 
blown. In a community in which the ministers of re- 
ligion are married men, and are honoured as such, and 
in which, as a consequeiice, domestic virtue reaches its 
highest mark — w^oman blessing man, as wife and mother 
— there, and in such a community, no efforts will avail 
to enrol companies of seraphs; on the contrary, contempt, 
and a well-merited disgust, will cover the busy promo- 
ters of any such pernicious folly. Morals and domestic 
felicity will be saved, and the bosom of the social system 
will be kept free from the worst of all plagues — a vir- 
gin priesthood; — in other words, bands of — men, we 
must not call them, wrought up to a silent frenzy, and 

45* 



530 CONNEXION OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

leagued against the purity and peace of every home near 
them. 

If there be any one practical injunction of the New 
Testament infinitely momentous, as afiecting the wel- 
fare of society, it is this one, which makes marriage a 
first qualification for office in the church. Let us look to 
it then that we adhere, herein, to the authority of scrip- 
ture, and resolutely oppose the insidious advances of 
those *' church principles," and of the Nicene Christi- 
anity, which, by the sure operation of the doctrine con- 
cerning celibacy, cut at the roots of the morals and do- 
mestic happiness of the community that admits them. 



THE CONNEXION OF THE ASCETIC INSTI- 
TUTE WITH RITUAL NOTIONS AND PRAC- 
TICES. 

Seven years ago, if undertaking to treat, philosophi- 
cally, of the progress of opinions in the church from the 
apostolic age, to the period of the council of Nice, one 
should have felt not a moment's hesitation in roundly 
affirming the fact of the connexion which w^e are now to 
speak of; for, what may be called the natural history of 
the sacramental superstition, one should have thought 
too obvious to require formal proof. It has, however, be- 
come necessary to advance with more caution upon 
ground which might well enough have been surveyed 
at a glance. 

There is, I believe, no controversy concerning the his- 
torical fact, that practices had been established, and that 
notions were prevalent, relating to the ritual parts of 



WITH RITUAL NOTIONS AND PRACTICES. 531 

Christianity, in the fourth century, of which we can dis- 
cover scarcely a trace in the apostolic age. No one pre- 
tends to affirm that Chrysostom, Ambrose, and Augustine, 
speak of baptism, and the eucharist, precisely as Paul, 
and Peter, and John, had spoken of them. A difference 
then, in this respect, had arisen in the course of three 
hundred years; but this difference, say the modern ad- 
vocates of church principles, was nothing more than the 
repining, or natural expansion of certain rudiments, which 
the apostles had mingled, silently, yet designedly, with 
the Christian institute. Discerning, or thinking that we 
discern these rudiments, even in the apostolic writings, 
we do well, it is said, to derive our own notions and 
practices, from the mature, rather than from the crude era 
of their history. If what was done and taught by the 
Nicene divines, in regard to the sacraments, was nothing 
more than what had been foreseen, and intended by the 
apostles, our part is to consult the Nicene, rather than 
the apostolic writings, on such points. 

But let it be asked, under whose auspices had this 
gradual expansion of ritual notions and practices been 
effected ? This question is surely a pertinent one, and 
the answer it must receive brings us at once to the alleged 
connexion between the ascetic institute (especially the 
clerical and monastic celibacy) and the sacramental doc- 
trine and practice of the Nicene age. 

This doctrine and this practice, were nothing else than 
what men, so placed, as were the clergy of the ancient 
church, would inevitably move toward, and adopt. That 
an unmarried clergy, professing and admiring the wildest 
extravagances of the oriental ascetisism, should have 
adhered, century after century, to the modesty, simplicity, 
and unobtrusive seriousness of the apostolic sacramental 



532 CONNEXION OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

doctrine, would have been a miracle far more astounding 
than any of those to which the church, even in St. Dun- 
stan's time, pretended. Every principle of human nature 
forbids such an incongruity, nor is an example of the 
sort presented by history: — it could not have been; — it 
is not to be believed; — it was not the fact. The Nicene 
sacramental doctrine was just such as might beseem, and 
accord with, the ascetic feeling and condition of the 
clerical body. A conclusion so manifestly true might 
be left unargued, with dispassionate and well informed 
minds. But we will follow the subject into some of 
its elements. 

The Nicene sacramental doctrine and practice, had 
then a general connexion with the prevailing asceticism, 
and they had some special points of connexion also, 
which must be briefly stated. 

Good sense, sobriety of judgment, and a tone of 
moderation and quietness, which belong to some men — 
a very few, by endowment of nature, can belong to a 
body of men, take them where you please, only as the 
consequence of circumstances, favouring the growth of 
such qualities of the mind and temper: and if the circum- 
stances of a body of men are of a kind to generate the 
very opposite qualities, it is not the influence of the few 
who may be of sound temperament, that will avail to 
contravene the powerful and constant operation of induce- 
ments and excitements, tending to inflame the heart, and 
pervert the reason. 

The apostolic injunction, that church oflficers should 
be married men, was more than a mere license, permit- 
ting what it might have been diflTicult to prevent; for it 
had a positive reason, and it was a provision, not simply 
against the grievous abuses that attend clerical celibacy; 
but it was a security for the moderation, and mental sa- 



WITH RITUAL NOTIONS AND PRACTICES. 533 

nity of those who were to be the leaders of opinion in 
the church. On the one side, let us imagine, that there 
is a body of men whose affections have been warmed 
and softened, and whose moral and religious notions 
have been corrected by a varied experience of, and an 
actual concernment with, the ordinary interests of life. 
On the other side, is a body that has been, by some vi- 
olent excitement, thrown or seduced out of the common 
path, and whose sympathies have no natural objects, 
who have not been happy, as other men, who have not 
shed tears, as others; who, while chafing under a sense 
of privation and inferiority, have also arrogantly chal- 
lenged for themselves peculiar honours; — men who, by 
being compelled, until it has become a habit, to look at 
their own condition under vehement excitements, as from 
a forced position, have learned to look at every thing 
else in the same unnatural manner. Now to which of 
these bodies shall we refer any moral, political, or theo- 
logical controversy? Even if a loftier style be found 
among the latter, will not soundness and sobriety of 
judgment be the prerogatives of the former? will not ex- 
cess — extravagance, severity, and practical absurdity, be 
the characteristics of the opinions of the latter? This 
we assume as unquestionable. Every man in his senses 
would make his appeal, in a cause of whatever kind, to 
the former, not to the latter. 

On this very ground it has been determined, by ex- 
press divine authority, that the rulers of the church, if 
not all who may exercise their gifts in its service, shall 
be married men. But, from a very early time, and 
more and more so, every year, onward to the Nicene 
age, the clergy were striving to reverse this rule; and, 
in the fourth century, the temper and habits of the cle* 



534 CONNEXION OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

rical body were entirely governed by the ascetic doc- 
trine; and the majority were actually unmarried men* 

At once then, and on every admitted principle of com- 
mon sense, and of scriptural authority, we. must appeal 
from the judgment of these unmarried ascetics — these 
unhumanized, these half crazed sophists, whose imagi- 
nations were habitually inflamed, whose animal system 
was deranged, whose notions were like themselves, 
harsh, acrid, malign, and who could neither think nor 
speak, but in hyperbole. From such men we will 
learn nothing — or nothing but a caution against folly and 
hypocrisy: — such lips, shrivelled and burning, are not 
w^ont to distil wisdom, nor will we seek it thence. There 
is then a prima facie case against the Nicene divines, 
inasmuch as they were not husbands and fathers, as 
church rulers should have been; but either frenzied fa- 
natics, or imbeciles, or hypocrites; or they were, indi- 
vidually, tending toward some one of these conditions. 

Even in relation to the most remote or abstracted 
point of theology, the judgment of a body of ascetics 
is sure to be perverted: much more so, if the question 
be of a kind involving the very principle of the ascetic 
life. So is it with the sacramental question; and the 
doctrine prevalent in the fourth century was nothing else 
but another form, or expression, of the very principle 
which the ascetic life imbodied. The ascetic error did 
not consist in a denial, or exclusion, of what is moral, 
spiritual, and real; but in thrusting forward, and in 
making too much of, what is visible, formal, and acci- 
dental. Holiness and purity were not denied; but vir- 
giiiity and bodily purity were chiefly talked of, and were 
regarded as if they implied, and conveyed, and were the 
equivalents of, genuine moral qualities. 



WITH RITUAL NOTIONS AKD PRACTICES. 535 

This insensible substitution of the form, for the sub- 
stance, is so prominently characteristic of the ascetic 
scheme of life, that I cannot suppose it to be called in 
question. But now, what was the sacramental doctrine 
of the very same men? It was — not a denial of grace, 
and of the spiritual realities of the Christian life, but a 
putting foremost, and a talking most of, the rite, as a rite. 
The very men who were accustomed to use the words 
sanctity, and virginity, continence, and celibacy, as sy- 
nonymous terms, or as equivalents, did also constantly 
speak of baptism, and of the eucharist, as intrinsically 
holy, and as conveying holiness; or, at the best, they so 
held up these rites before the people, as led them to pay 
a superstitious and fatally exclusive regard to the cere- 
mony, while moral and spiritual qualities, or states of 
the heart, were lost sight of. — The very man who thinks 
himself as holy as Gabriel, because a virgin, and who 
reckons so many hours' fasting to be worth a certain 
quantum of expiatory merit, is he who attributes a justi- 
fying and sanctifying efficacy to baptismal water, and 
believes that tiie swallowing, or the carrying about with 
him, a consecrated wafer, shall get him admitted into 
heaven. Is there then no oneness of principle, in these 
several notions? But if the analogy be admitted, then, 
to be consistent, we should either admit the ascetic, 
along with the sacramental doctrine, both springing, as 
they do, from the same principle; or else, rejecting that 
principle, disallow both of its consequences. 

The sacramental and the ascetic doctrine were, how- 
ever, connected by yet another link. We have adverted 
to the fact that it was the ascetics exclusively, or nearly 
so, who pretended to miraculous powers, and it was they 
too who were the dealers with the demon legions. That 
is to say, men who are cut off from the employments, 



536 CONNEXION OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

interests, cares, and enjoyments of common life, and 
who are kept also out of the school of common sense, 
must provide themselves with excitements of another 
order, and they will court such as, being condemned by 
reason, will be left to their uninvaded enjoyment. — In 
other words, monks and hermits, and men forced by wild 
notions of religion from off the path of humanity — such, 
will feed upon wonders. The transition from what is 
unnatural to what is supernatural, is an easy process, 
needing nothing but so much religious belief as may fall 
far short of what would render a man either pious or 
moral. 

But the supernatural has its two species, and super- 
stition has, therefore, its two kinds. Events out of the 
course of nature are either irregular or regular, the one 
being directly miraculous, the other indirectly so, and 
subjected to a fixed mode of operation. The first are 
miraculous in the usual sense of the word; the second, 
consisting in ritual performances, involve an immediate 
interposition of the divine power, but yet are infallibly 
connected with the due observance of certain ceremonies. 
The exorcisms of the ancient church occupied a place 
between these two species of miracles; for, while they 
were occasional and visible, like proper miracles, they, 
nevertheless, followed, infallibly a given formula, and 
were effected, like any other church service, by a dis- 
tinct class of ecclesiastics. The exorcists were officers 
who could expel demons more certainly tlian pliysicians 
can heal the most curable diseases. 

There were many otlier influences, not now to be 
spoken of, which concurred in bringing forward the sa- 
cramental superstition; but the one we have here in view 
would have been enough alone. When all the more 
ferveat-minded of the clergy, along with the ambitious. 



WITH RITUAL NOTIONS AND PRACTICES. 637 

and the credulous, affected celibacy, and were in fact 
ascetics — debarred from every salutary and corrective 
motive, these would be tending, with the regulars, to- 
ward the miraculous, in both kinds. It cannot be ima- 
gined that men breathing the stifling atmosphere of reli- 
gious houses, and ever gaping for miracles, — seeing vi- 
sions, hearing voices, encountering legions of demons, — 
that such should be contented to rest in a ritual purely 
spiritual and rational, and which secured edification by 
the divine blessing upon the use of ordinary means of 
instruction and persuasion. No such rule of sobriety 
and simplicity could satisfy men who, instead of coming 
from their homes to church, and of returning from church 
to their homes, issued from cloisters, and returned to 
cloisters. The sacramental miracles, which blaze on 
the pages of Chrysostom — *' the terrible mysteries," 
which archangels dared not look upon — are the awful 
rites of a religion whose ministers (the serious and sin- 
cere among them) have been wrought up into an habitual 
sombre frenzy, and to whom nothing is real but the un- 
real. 

The sacraments, just as we find them alluded to in the 
New Testament, may well and fitly be administered by 
one who, in going forth to his duties, returns a chubby 
infant to its mother's arras, and who, in returning, is 
greeted by laughing eyes and clapping of hands. The 
religion of the apostles is part and parcel with the natu- 
ral and domestic condition of the human heart; it is pure, 
kindly, gentle, and soothing to every affection of our na- 
ture. Its observances are not ''terrible" — "astound- 
ing" — " ineflable:" they are not the wonder-fraught 
rites of the Nicene church;- — no, because the apostolic 
ministers, bishops, presbyters, deacons, were men still; 

46 



538 CONNEXION OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

but the Nicene bishops, priests, deacons' — what must we 
call them, seeing that they had put off from themselves 
all the better qualities of the manly nature? The differ- 
ence "between the apostolic and the Nicene clergy, as to 
their personal and social condition, just measures out the 
confessed difference between the apostolic rites, and tlie 
Nicene mysteries. 

But farther; the sacramental doctrine and practice of 
the Nicene, and of the ante-Nicene church, had a spe- 
cial ecclesiastical import, which offers itself to the eye 
of every impartial inquirer. The church, very early, 
had gathered around itself a various mass, which it had 
to govern, by means altogether of a factitious kind. 
While, on the one side, it had forfeited the vital energy 
of apostolic truth, having compromised, as well doctrines 
as precepts, it had driven a portion of its members into 
a position where, to govern them at all, was a task of the 
highest imaginable difficulty. Not now to speak of the 
clergy themselves, let it be considered that every local 
church had, under its care, companies of women, elder and 
younger, who being removed from their natural guardians, 
whether husbands, or parents, or brothers, had also been 
pushed forward to sustain a part they were few of them 
equal to. These women were, for the most part, de- 
pendent for their daily bread upon the church, and the 
condition of their receiving this eleemosynary mainte- 
nance, was their being in communion therewith. As 
poor merely, their moral and spiritual state might have 
been overlooked; but as virgins, they could advance no 
claim irrespective of their personal deserts. 

Unless we bear these simple facts in mind, it will be 
impossible to understand the motive of that intense 
anxiety not to be excluded from communion, which in- 
duced the nuns to submit, as reported by Cyprian and by 



WITH RITUAL NOTIONS AND PRACTICES. 539 

Chrysostom, to the last humiliations, in attestation of 
their virtue. These things were not occasional, but or- 
dinary; and not even the vicious operation of the ascetic 
institute can be believed so far to have robbed woman 
of her proper nature, and of her self-respect, as is im- 
plied in these revolting usages — unless it be under the 
pressure of some cruel necessity. Pitiable indeed was 
the condition of multitudes of young women who had 
been driven by fanatical or licentious priests, or cruel re- 
latives, at the earliest age, into convents (or into the 
profession of virginity) and who, thus reduced to help- 
lessness, were compelled, from lime to time, to earn 
their ticket for the sacrament, and for their bread, by 
shameful compliances. 

It is manifest, however, that an influence of a higher 
sort than that which might arise from the mere anxiety 
of a pensioner, would be kept in force, if possible. 
That is to say, communion with the church, and a par- 
ticipation in the rite which sealed and signified that com- 
munion, besides its vulgar import, to these pensioners, 
would be surrounded with loftier and more impressive 
sentiments. The clergy, feeling the peculiar difficulty 
of their task, in having to govern, before the eye of the 
church and the world, the virgin company, would do 
and say every thing tending to strengthen their influence 
over the imaginations of the governed, and to bring them 
within the range of more refined hopes and fears. 

As to the genuine motives of piety, it were absurd to 
suppose that these could take effect upon the minds of 
women such as were those spoken of by Cyprian, Je- 
rome, and Chrysostom. Yet such, even the most frivo- 
lous, and the most licentious, are often vividly alive to 
superstitious terrors. In modern catholic countries this 
combination is found to involve nothing that is incompa- 



540 CONNEXION OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

tible; and the nuns of Antioch, in the Nicene age, gave 
proof also of the harmony of these same elements. 

The clergy had a cumbrous engine to work; and, to 
keep it in order, tliey availed themselves of every means 
which they found would take effect upon it. Hence the 
mysterious terrors wherewith the eucharistic rite was 
enveloped. Minds hardened against the genuine motives 
of the gospel, might yet be overawed by the terrors of 
the eucharistic ceremonial; and might be made to trem- 
ble by the threat of being driven from the altar. One 
cannot read those overwrought passages in which the 
great Nicene preachers are labouring to invest the cele- 
bration of the mysteries with terrors — even with hor- 
rors, and not feel that there was an unconfessed motive, 
a secret necessity, a latent reason of government, at the 
bottom of all. this astounding rhetoric. The apostles were 
accustomed to speak in no such style of their ''break- 
ing of bread;" no, for the apostles had no convents and 
monasteries to manage. 

The eucharistic rite may very well be regarded as the 
hinge of the ecclesiastical economy of the Nicene age. 
There was a tendency of every thing toward it; it was 
more thouglit of and regarded than any other element 
of the religious system; the highest benefits were con- 
nected with a due participation in it, and the most terri- 
ble evils were the consequences of even a temporary ex- 
clusion from the privilege. Before the time when tlie 
church wielded secular powers, excommuaication was 
its last resource, in dealing with the refractory; and after 
the time when ecclesiastical censures were followed by 
civil pains, it continued to be the terrible precursive act 
of a process which might deprive the victim of fortune, 
liberty, life, and consign him to eternal misery. 

Now, it can never be believed that this well-designated 



WITH RITUAL NOTIONS AND PRACTICES. 541 

"terrible mystery" should have continued, from age to 
age, unchanged, while the scheme of government of 
which it was the hinge was advancing from the simplest 
condition of an humble association of guileless men and 
women, to that of a vast, complicated, wealthy, and am- 
bitious polity, embracing interests of all kinds, and bind- 
ing together various bodies, and these wrought up to a 
state of unnatural excitement. Look at the apostolic 
church, such as we may suppose it to have been in read- 
ing the Acts of the Apostles: look at the churches of the 
Nicene age, at Antioch, Constantinople, Rome, Milan, 
three centuries afterwards, and then consider whether 
that ''breaking of bread," which was the symbol of 
communion in the one society, was likely to have un- 
dergone no changes when it came to be the symbol of 
communion in the other! In truth, the two rites differ 
just as the two societies differ; and the two differed in 
their first principles, in their ingredients, and in their 
spiritual and moral characteristics. 

What is now proposed to the protestant church is ia 
substance this — To leave, as crude, or as " undeveloped," 
the ritual elements of Christianity, such as tliey may be 
gathered from the monuments of the apostolic age, and 
to take these elements from the hands of the ascetic, un- 
married (often licentious and ambitious) superstitious, and 
fanatical clergy of the fourth century. 

Were it not better to yield ourselves at once to the 
better-digested doctrine and practice of the later (Romish) 
church? If a power of gradual development belongs at 
all to the church, (and unless this is supposed, the ripened 
doctrine and worship of the Nicene age has no authority, 
and is nothing but innovation,) then, how can we be sure 
that this power had exhausted itself, or had been abro- 

46* 



542 CONNEXION OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

gated, precisely in the fourth century? On what grounds 
do we resist its operation as extant in the fifth, sixth, 
seventh? Or, why believe that it put forth its last energy, 
and expired, in the acts of the council of Trent? The 
church of Rome may, indeed, choose to take her stand 
at this point; but she is not, in principle, compelled to 
do so, and might even now, on urgent motives, so modify 
her past decisions (never will she change her nature) as 
to enable her to invite the return to her bosom of some 
whom she sees to be mourning their alienation from her 
maternaL embraces. 

The power which removed the cup from the lips of 
the laity, may restore the boon; or it may so expound 
any article of faith as lo open a door of return to the 
penitent. Whether it will, or may, make any such con- 
cessions, or not, the church of Rome, at the present mo- 
ment, does not leave her banished ones to doubt of the 
yearnings of her heart toward them, l^they would fain 
return, she, on her part, would fain receive them. The 
feeling pervading the catholic world, and cherished espe- 
cially at Rome, in regard to the Oxford divines, and their 
party, has not failed to express itself, and will probably 
become more and more decisive: witness the follow- 
ing:— 

" The attention of all good catholics, and especially 
of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, 
cannot be enough excited by the present state of religion, 
in England, in consequence of the new doctrine, pro- 
pagated with so much ability and success, by Messrs. 
Newman, Pusey, and Keble, with arguments drawn from 
the holy fathers, of wliich they have just undertaken a 
new edition (translation) in English. 'J'hese gentlemen 
labour to restore the ancient catholic liturgy — the breviary 
(whicli many of them, to the knowledge of the writer. 



WITII RITUAL NOTION'S AND PRACTICES. 643 

tecite daily,) fastings, the monastic life, and many other 
religious practices. Moreover they teach the insufficien- 
cy of the Bible, as a rule of faith — the necessity of tra- 
dition, and of ecclesiastical authority — the real presence 
— prayers for the dead — the use of images^ — ^the priests' 
power of absolution — the sacrifice of the mass — the devo- 
tion to the virgin, and many other catholic doctrines, in 
such sort as to leave but little difference between their 
opinions and the true faith, and which difference becomes 
less and less every da}^ Faithful! redouble your prayers, 
that these happy dispositions may be increased!"* 

Whilst the Romish church anticipates the happiest 
consequences to result from the movement now taking 
place in England, she need not entertain much anxiety 
concerning the course to be adopted when the question 
of an actual reconciliation may come on. She has an 
argument in reserve, which, even apart from any small 
concessions, may be found effective in overcoming the 
scruples of conscientious men. A Romanist might thus 
address the advocates of Oxford Tract principles — 

"You tell us that certain dogmas and practices con- 
firmed by the council of Trent, are neither catholic nor 
ancient. Grant it, and yet we might demand, on gene- 
ral principles, the submission of those (or their silent 
conformity) who, while they think much of the crimi- 
nality of schism, also hold that the church, from the 
first, has possessed a permanent legislative and adminis- 

* Avvenimenti Edincanti massime Recenti, &c. p. 14. Roma, 
1839. Con facolta. In other numbers of this rehgious periodi- 
cal occur allusions to the progress of ^^ sound opinions " in Eng- 
land, which might perhaps startle the persons implicated, as well 
as the public. The passage cited above is thus designated in the 
tableof contents— Mirabile avvicinamentofraprotestanti alle Dot* 
trine Cattoliche. 



544 CONNEXION OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE 

trative authority. — If it did not, how shall we justify 
the many additions made to apostolic practice during the 
first three centuries? — Your church principles, what are 
they, if there be no such authority? But if there be, 
then how do you prove that it came to an end, and did 
not flow on to the church of Rome — at least in regard to 
western Christendom? 

*' But leaving this; we think it does not become you 
to except against our dogmas and practices on tlie ground 
of the alleged authority of a higher antiquity, until you 
have yourselves yielded, fully and openly, to that same 
authority; and especially in those matters which it 
affirms to be of prime importance. In claiming the 
right, as you seem to do, to reject certain parts of the 
ancient church system, on the plea of a higher scriptural 
authority, that is, on the strength of your private inter- 
pretation of the canonical writings, you go the whole 
length of heretics and ultra protestants, who do nothing 
worse; and all the difference between you and them, will 
be a difference in particulars. This is not to adhere to 
church principles. 

'* Now, as you well know, the ascetic doctrine, ex- 
pressed in the monastic life, and the consequent celibacy 
of the clergy, claim all the weight and authority that 
can be derived from the sanction of high antiquity, and 
universal consent. Ycu know that the monastic sys- 
tem was an intimate and inseparable element of the reli- 
gious and ecclesiastical system, at the time to which you 
attribute such an authority, as that it should overrule 
the later enactments of the I^omish church. You have 
yourselves admitted the abstract excellence of the ascetic 
life; — you adopt, as far as you can, its characteristic de- 
votional exercises, and you give the world reason to 



WITH RITUAL NOTIONS AXD PRACTICES. 545 

believe that the restoration of the monastic orders would 
be by no means disagreeable to you. 

" But, to advance so far, is to advance too far, or not 
far enough. You stand in an ambiguous position which 
it is hard to justify on any general principle whatever. 
Even if the reformers had some pretexts for change, in 
relation to certain abuses of the Romish church, it was 
their high sin to have rejected and blasphemed the mo- 
nastic system — unquestionably ancient as it is: — this 
system was no popish corruption; and to cast it out as 
evil, is to subvert the first principle of church authority, 
and to set up another, even that of the ultra-protestant 
principle. But what say you to the church within 
which, at the peril of your souls, you remain, and at 
whose altar you minister? Your church has outraged 
catholic antiquity by its rejection of monasticism. Your 
church has no holy virgins: but was there any ancient 
church that had not, or that did not make its boast of 
them? Your church has not a monastery, or a convent, 
or a hermit, or any one of those things which the church 
universal of the Nicene age regarded as of the highest 
value. Call, now, St. Athanasius, and St. Basil, and St. 
Ambrose, and St. John Chrysostom, and St. Gregory 
Nazianzen, and St. Augustine, call them from their high 
seats in glory, and let them judge between you and us! 
What name think you would these holy doctors bestow 
upon a church shorn of all the honours of virginity — 
naked, naked, as it is? With v/hat emotions of horror 
would they look around upon your married bishops, 
your married priests; — bishops and priests married after 
ordination — married, some of them, a second time — it 
may be a third! Tell us then, are you bearing a faith- 
ful and courageous testimony to holy catholic principles, 
ia conforming to a church which, as vou cannot doubt^ 



54G CONNEXION OF THE ASCETIC INSTITUTE, <fec. 

would have been spurned and condemned by all the 
fathers and saints of the best age? 

*' Tell us, and tell tlie world plainly, do you thhik with 
the holy fathers, above named, on these momentous sub- 
jects; or do you think with the founders of your pro- 
testant church? You are w^ont to use strong language 
(though not too strong) in speaking of the sin and dan- 
ger of dissent; but may not a man sometimes do w-orse 
in conforming, than he could in dissenting? Dissenters, 
if they sincerely think what they profess, are at least 
honest men. But now, do you think with your church 
in those prominent matters in relation to which it con- 
tradicts and impugns catholic antiquity? If you think 
with your church concerning tlie monastic life, the merit 
of virginity, the invocation of saints, the devotion paid 
to holy relics, and the like, where is your professed de- 
ference to antiquity? If you do not think with it in 
these points, essential as they are, what are you but dis- 
senters — wanting courage?" 

Obvious reasons of policy may induce the Romish 
church to forbid itself, at present, the use of arguments 
such as the above. In what way the cogency of them, 
when advanced, may be evaded, remains to be seen. 
The Oxford Tract divines are not Romanists in disguise; 
they do riQt intend the re-establishment of popery; but 
they devoutly admire, and would gladly restore, that 
which the English reformers did not intend, and which 
they rejected, feeling and seeing its contrariety to aposto- 
lic doctrine and morals. 

These accomplished and devout divines have, as it 
seems, advanced at a too rapid rate; not duly consider- 
ing that, though reformation may be quick-paced, and 
even sudden, the advances or the return of superstitions 



ADDITIONAL REFERENCES AND CITATIONS. 547 

(let the word be pardoned) must always, in the nature 
of things, be slow. Seven or ten years will not bring 
about the changes which were the work of two or three 
centuries. By this precipitation they have become se- 
riously insnared;— insnared as churchmen, approving 
what their church does not allow, or has pointedly con- 
demned: — insnared as the professed adherents of catho- 
lic antiquity, by not bearing their testimony openly and 
practically, to every catholic principle. 

From these embarrassments they may indeed with- 
draw themselves, silently and insensibly, if time be al- 
lowed them for gradually shifting their position, and for 
retracting, little by little, what has been said — before its 
time. Mean while the cordially affected adherents of 
the reformation must wish to see tlie present controver- 
sy dealt with in the most summary method, and brought 
to the speediest possible conclusion. 



ADDITIONAL REFERENCES AND CITATIONS. 

In the preceding pages I have purposely avoided 
throwing the stress of my argument, in any instance, 
upon facts or testimonies of a recondite or questiona- 
ble kind, and have appealed only to evidence which 
abounds on all sides, and of which any one may readily 
collect more than enough, who has access to the works 
where it is to be found. Even a few days' industry, 
properly directed, would amply suffice for enabling the 
reader to satisfy himself concerning all the statements 



V'- 



548 ADDITIONAL REFERENCES AND CITATIONS. 

or allegations to which, in these numbers, any impor-' 
tance is attached. It is not indeed to be supposed that 
many should give themselves even this degree of trouble, 
some, however, will do so;- — more than a very few are 
actually engaged in researches of this sort, and it is much 
to be desired that they should be continued until the 
truth, and the whole truth, concerning the religious opi- 
nions and practices of the first six centuries has become 
generally diffused. 1 1 is only by the means of this 
knowledge of antiquity that we can be qualified to deal 
with Romanism, or can be secured against the insidi- 
ous advances of that species of pietism of which popery 
is merely a digested scheme. 

More with the view of saving the labour of any who 
may be entering upon these studies, than of substan- 
tiating in a formal manner statements w^hich no well in- 
formed opponent would think of calling in question, I 
shall now point out the path in pursuing which the read- 
er may, with very little expense of time, satisfy him- 
self as to the condition of the Nicene church, in regard 
to one or two principal points which have been glanced 
at in the preceding pages: and in order to preclude an 
incidental disappointment, 1 will refer to those w^orka 
only which are the most likely to be accessible to the 
reader. In fact, it is the evidence of these few that is 
the most conclusive: what is recondite and rare would 
be so much the less satisfactory. 

One principal point referred to in these numbers, is 
the actual condition, from the first, of the ascetic insti- 
tute. The evidence bearing upon this subject has a dou- 
ble importance, first, inasmuch as it dissipates the fond 
and dangerous illusion concerning an age of purity, and 
of generally diffused truth and holiness; and, secondly. 



if 

r* 



ADDITIONAL REFERENCES AND CITATIONS. 549 

as it tends to discourage and to arrest the attempts, now 
so industriously making, to re-establish the celibate. 

The ascetic institute and the celibate has existed under 
three distinguishable conditions — -ihejirst, that in which 
we find it in the middle of the third century, when it 
was the least artificial in its constitution, and, one would 
suppose, the least liable to abuses. What it v/as in fapt, 
at that time, may be gathered from those passages in 
Cyprian to which I have already referred, p. 113. The 
epistle to Pomponius, and the Treatise de liabitu Virgi- 
num, must be perused entire. The second condition is 
that of the Nicene age, when monasteries and convents 
were springing up on all sides, and when the ascetic 
feeling (mania) was at its height. The third, is that re- 
gulated and severe form, imposed upon the monastic or- 
ders under the auspices of the Romish church, and with 
which at present we have nothing to do. It is with the 
second that we are concerned. Does the inquirer choose 
then to take his idea of the Nicene asceticism from de- 
votional pieces, and hortatory compositions, showing 
what it should have been; or from the direct and indi- 
rect admissions of its admirers? I presume the latter 
course to be preferred; nor can we do better than open 
Chrysostom; and it is curious to turn from any of his 
splendid descriptions of the celestial polity which the 
monastic orders professed to realize (as tom. i. p. 115) 
to passages such as the one already cited (p. 405) and 
to the two treatises, in one of which this passage occurs. 
I will say nothing more of them than that they should 
serve as a caution against the easy, but dangerous error 
of supposing that modern church historians, have fully 
and fairly depicted the ancient church. The very facts 
most necessary to be known, are barely glanced at by 

47 



550 ADDITIONAL REFERENCES AND CITATIONS. 

any of these writers. The first of these admonitory 

treatises is addressed ergo? rov; i^ovT^s TrupQivovg a-uvua-ciKrovc 

the title of the second is — ^Tn^t rov ^« ra.c KAvovncoig a-woncuv 
cLv^^cta-iv. It is manifest that the practices inveighed 
against were common, and the abuses mentioned noto- 
rious. There is, indeed, nothing to be wondered at in 
these things — except it be the infatuation of those who, 
with such facts before them, could yet persist in the en- 
deavour so to fight against human nature, common sense, 
and Christianity. Basil's Treatise on Virginity, which 
I will not recommend the reader to make himself ac- 
quainted with, gives indications enough of the existence 
and frequency of abuses even worse than those referred 
to by Chrysostom. Jerome, cautious, and yet caustic, 
can neither withhold the truth, nor plainly declare ii; in 
his Epistle to Eustochium he must be listened to as a 
reluctant witness, intimating more than he will say. 
Elsewhere, however, he freely admits that the excellence 
professed by the two classes of ascetics was but rarely 
realized. Comment, in Lament, cap. 3. Sed rara est, 
etpaucissimis dono Dei haec perfectio concessa. Again, 
in the epistle — Ad Rusticum Monachum, the truth comes 
out, and it appears plainly that the system exhibited, in 
Jerome's time, every one of those inherent bad qualities 
which have always drawn upon it the contempt and ab- 
horrence of mankind. This epistle (of a few pages only) 
the studious reader will peruse throughout: no evidence 
can be more unexceptionable. Alone, Jerome's testi- 
mony might well be admitted as suflicient; but it accords 
minutely with that of Chrysostom, especially as to the cus- 
tom against which the first of the above-named treatises 
is directed. — " Some you ii?5ay see with their loins girt, 
clad in dingy cloaks, with long beards, who yet can never 
break away from the company of women; but live under 



ADDITIONAL REFERENCES AND CITATIONS. 551 

the same roof, sit at the same tables, are waited upon by 
young girls, and want nothing proper to the married state, 
except — wives! The luxury commonly indulged in by 
the rich ascetics, the ostentatious and rapacious practices 
of the poor, and the insanity of the fanatical sort, are 
spoken of without disguise. Vidi ego quosdam, &:c. . . 
publico extendentes manus, pannis aurum tegimus, et con- 
tra omnium opinionem, plenis sacculis morimur divites, 
qui quasi pauperes viximus. Nothing else can be inferred 
from this epistle (and see, ad Nepot.) than that the gra- 
phic description it contains of knavery, licentiousness, and 
insanity, was applicable to the many; and that the excep- 
tions were few: nequaquam considerans quid alii mali 
faciunt, sed quid boni tu facere debeas; neque vero pec- 
cantium ducaris midliludine, et te pereuntium turba, &c. 
This sort of evidence, furnished by a passionate admirer 
of the ascetic institute, ought to be considered as con- 
clusive. Erasmus, determined to give the ancient monks 
a credit, at the expense of his contemporaries, contra- 
dicts the clearest testimonies in his ''Antidote" to this 
epistle, which, by tho way, is highly curious as indica- 
tive of the approaching reformation, I beg to commend 
the passage to the attention of the modern admirers of 
ascetic practices, quae, says Erasmus, magis ad judaeos 
pertinent, quam ad christianos, et superstitiosum facere 
possunt, pium non possunt. Does not all experience 
confirm this testimony? 

I really resent the humiliation of making grave refe- 
rences to book and chapter of a work like that of Cas- 
sian. If called upon to make good any of the asser- 
tions or intimations concerning the Nicene monkery 
which I may have left unsupported by direct citations, 
Cassian would help me out of every difficulty. The 
monastic rules of St. Pachomius are appended to this 



552 ADDITIONAL REFEREXCES AND CITATIONS. 

writer's Institutes, and exhibit the spirit and quality of 
the monastic life: they are prefaced by Jerome, with a 
brief and curious account of it, as then established in 
the Thebais, under the immediate direction of '*an an- 
gel sent from heaven," for this purpose. 

But the reader who would give the ancient asceticism 
the highest possible advantage, will take his idea of it 
from Basil. This father's ascetic writings do not occu- 
py much space, and they should be read by those who are 
ROW told that the monastic system of the ancient church 
was wise, holy, rational, and Christian-like. These 
compositions are — some of his epistles, as those to Na- 
zianzen, and to Amphilochius: the treatises — on virginity, 
and on abdication of the world, and spiritual perfection. 
By the way, why should not this treatise find a place 
among "selections" from the fathers? Let us have it 
faithfully rendered, and without retrenchment. Basil 
says to his disciple — a young monk — " Hast thou left 
thy cell? Thou hast left there thy virtue." What sort 
ef virtue is that which evaporates the moment it is ex- 
posed to daylight? or what is the whole meaning of the 
impassioned advice — " Shun the society of those of thine 
own age; Yea, flee from it as from a burning flame?" 
How few then are the steps that lead from the doctrine 
of angelic virginity, to the lowest depths! First comes 
celibacy, imposed upon youths of ardent temperament — 
then, by necessity, the stern separation of the sexes; 
and next — what? we may learn from Basil! It is not 
without vehement emotions of disgust and indignation 
that one sees this ancient and worst device of the devil 
set a going again, after such proofs of its true quality. 
Basil's ''Monastic Institutions," and "Rules," longer 
and shorter, imbody all points of the theory and prac- 
tice of the ascetic life; and whoever wishes to know 



ADDITIONAL REFERENCES AND CITATIONS. 553 

what it was, will read these throughout. Compelled to 
forego the ample citations I had intended, I will point 
to a few expressions only, as they present themselves. 
Ad Amphiloc. 2. Basil decides that girls should not 
be allowed to profess before their sixteenth, or seven- 
teenth years. Any irregularity fallen into by those 
who had voluntarily devoted themselves at this mature 
age, was to be punished with " inexorable severity!" 
He enjoins also that when parents or brothers, or, as 
sometimes happened, distant relatives, brought girls to 
the convent, from interested motives, the consent of the 
victim should be ascertained! The Monast. Constit. 
commence by recommending a total surrender of the 
soul and body to God, including (cap. xx.) the renun- 
ciation of every tie of kindred; " it is the devil's craft," 
sa^'s Basil, "to keep alive in the mind of the monk a 
recollection of his parents and natural relatives, so as 
that, under colour of rendering them some aid, he may 
be drawn aside from his heavenly course!" Let us now 
compare theory with facts. We hear Basil (cap. iii.) 
strictly forbidding, except in cases of the most extreme 
necessity, any sort of intercourse with women. At 
the same moment the monk^, generally, according to 
Jerome and Chrysostom, were maintaining as many 
girls about them as their means would allow ! Pa- 
chomius forbids a monk to secrete any thing in his 
cell, not even an apple; and Basil insists, again and 
again, that his monks are to renounce every atom of pri- 
vate property, as cap. xviii.; but Jerome tells us that 
the monks about him were gathering wealth within their 
ragged sleeves. To Basil's rule that a monk should 
cease to care for his relatives, some, he tells us, object- 
ed the apostle's declaration — ** If a man provide not for 



564 ADDITIONAL REFERENCES AND CITATIONS. 

his own," (fee. Yes, but Paul addressed this to the 
livings not to the dead; but a genuine monk is virtually 
dead to the world, although breathing the upper air; and 
as such, he is exempt from every secular obligation! 
cap. XX. *' as dead thou art free from all contributions 
for the benefit of thy natural relatives; and, as utterly a 
pauper, thou hast nothing which thou canst bestow." Is 
not this nearly the same as the "corban" of the phari- 
sees? In his second discourse, Constit. Monast., Basil 
insists upon the greater severity needful in the govern- 
ment of convents, and imposes restrictions which one 
would imagine must have secured a degree of decorum. 
How far these rules were regarded, we may best learn 
from Chrysostom. I must cut short these references, 
only taking the liberty to recommend those who may now 
be carrying the " Hymni Ecclesiae" in their pockets, or 
in their bosoms, to look into the history of monkery, 
from the Nicene age, onward, before they allow them- 
selves to speak of it as a heaven-born institution. 



THE END. 



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